Blooming in the Wild (23 page)

“More importantly,” Bella said, as another need became apparent, “I haven’t been to the bathroom. Be right back.”

She slipped out of bed and reached for the red shorty robe hanging nearby. Someone had dressed her in her usual tank and boxers, she noted. The last thing she recalled wearing was nothing—but that had been in Pele’s cave.

Claire gasped, and Bella turned to find both of her friends staring at her, their faces shocked. “What?”

“You—you have tattoos,” Claire managed. “Like the Ho’omalu men, where they’ve been wounded.”

“I do?” Bella looked down at herself.

“Your arm,” Melia whispered. “And your leg. And, I’m pretty sure I saw some ink between your shorts and top. Oh, honey, what happened to you out there?”

“Close the door,” Bella said.

Claire leapt off the bed in a flurry of long limbs. As soon as the bedroom door closed, Bella ripped off the robe and then yanked off her tank and boxers. She stared at herself in the mirror hanging by the bathroom door.

Delicate tattoos marked her left thigh, her right forearm and the slope of her right hip.

David had several tattoos, and Daniel even sported tattoos on his bearded face. Homu and Hilo had many as well.

Hers were intricate, swirling designs, tribal yet feminine. Very different from those her male cousins bore but tying her to them with invisible strands of shared victory.

“That’s where she shot me,” she remembered, stroking her fingertips over the tattoos. Now that she knew they were there, she realized that the skin there itched and even burned a little.

“Aloe cream works great on the irritation,” Claire said, touching her own arm. She’d had a small, pretty wave inked on her upper arm to cover the scar of a wound received beside Daniel in battle.

“Yours are prettier than mine,” she added, moving to stand behind Bella at the mirror. She shook her blonde head and smiled ruefully. “Pele’s magic does excellent ink.”

“And you look fabulous,” Melia added.

“Mahalo.” Her friends were right, Bella realized. She did look different. She looked…great, like a woman who was sure of herself and her place in the world. Sure of what she felt and what she wanted. She looked damn good, and she was going to use that to go after the man she loved.

“I’m quitting my job,” she told the two faces reflected in the mirror behind hers. “And I’m going to stay here. In Hawaii.”

Smiling at their identical looks of shock, she caught up her discarded things and sauntered into the bathroom.

Supper that evening at Nawea was an occasion. Homu and Tina were there, as was Hilo. David and Melia, Daniel and Claire, Daro and Jason, and even Zane had appeared, on a quick visit from school at the U of H.

Frank was waiting to hug Bella as she descended the stairs, and his sister Leilani came out of the kitchen to say hello.

Everyone carried dinner down to the patio table. Nawea was a lovely sight in the lavender dusk, surrounded by flickering light of tiki torches and the banks of blooming shrubbery, the sea an expanse of dark silver stretching to the horizon, and the dark bulk of the mountain crouched protectively behind them.

Homu stood at the end of the long table, holding his glass high. “I propose a toast. To our own brave wahine, Bella Moran-Ho’omalu, who, through the worst the enemies of Hawaii could throw at her, persevered and fought bravely and well. To Bella.”

The others raised their glasses high and looked at Bella, seated between her father and Zane. “To Bella. You’re a real ho’omalu now,” Hilo added. “You have faced the same family that David and Daniel battled and won, as they did.”

“I knew we’d get those Helmans in the end,” Daniel added, with a glinting smile. “But I never thought my little slip of a wahine cousin would bring down the last of them.”

Bella smiled mistily at them all. “Mahalo, my ohana. You kept me strong, and you saved me.”

“And you got some great ink,” Zane added enviously. The others laughed as she swatted him playfully.

“And I have a toast,” Bella added, rising. She looked at Frank, sitting across the table from her. “To the toughest, bravest kanaka I’ve ever met. He stayed cool through—well, a nightmare. And he saved my life. Mahalo, Frank.”

As one, the Ho’omalus rose to their feet and saluted their friend, who looked a little stunned. He smiled at Bella and nodded his thanks, his eyes bright. “I’m just glad I finally understand you Ho’omalus.”

Claire leaned over and kissed him on the cheek.

“Hey,” Daniel grumbled. “How about me? I scratched my boat getting out of that harbor.”

His fiancée rolled her eyes. “His other love. I’m jealous of a boat.”

“I had to land the chopper on a rocking barge,” David chimed in. “And listen to Mama while I did it.”

Tina Ho’omalu drew herself up magnificently. “I never said a word, David.”

He grinned at her. “I could hear what you were thinking. ‘He’s going to crash this thing, I know it! We’re all going to die because they let my baby boy touch the controls of an aircraft!’”

She shook her napkin at him. “Yes, and I diapered your bottom, so you will always be my baby too.”

By this time everyone was laughing. Bella looked around the table and felt at once happy, and yet as if there was a hole in her heart. Because her joy wouldn’t be complete until Joel was beside her.

If he’d stay. She took another drink of her mai tai, cool and fruity, and set it down.

Daro patted her hand. “Your mama will be here tomorrow,” he said. “She’ll be glad to see you in one piece.”

Melia gave Bella a sly look across the table. “I don’t think that’s who she’s missing.”

David smiled at Bella. “I hear the hospital in Kona is mobbed with news crews and tourists,” he said, sympathy in his gorgeous eyes. “A certain television celebrity with gunshot wounds.”

“They’re not letting anyone near him,” Zane agreed.

Bella’s heart sank. There went her plans to visit him in the morning. She’d tried to call his hospital room that morning, only to be informed Mr. Girand was not receiving calls. Trying his cell phone, she’d gotten an automated message asking her to leave a number.

“I know one of the doctors there,” Daniel said. Bella shook her head uncomprehending. Her big, scary cousin winked solemnly at her. “He may just have hospital rounds tomorrow. Drives a big SUV with shaded windows.”

“The doctor’s entrance.” David nodded. “She can slide right in, take the medical elevator up.”

Bella’s spirits took wing. She smiled at the brothers. “Mahalo, guys.”

To Do: In the event a member of the tour is forced to seek local care, the tour director will oversee his care, making sure he has the best of everything
.

Joel hated hospitals. He’d been in them numerous times. There’d been the rock slide in western Montana, the skiing accident in Canada, and the snake bite in Africa. Now that had been a scary place—he’d begged his crew not to leave him in the small hellhole of a hospital they found after hours of driving. Thank God they’d listened and hired a plane to spirit him across a border into a wealthier area, where the doctors washed their hands and didn’t offer to amputate his leg “very cheap, very little money”.

The Kona hospital was cheery, spotless, and everyone from nurses to orderlies radiated the laid-back aloha spirit of the Big Island. But Joel was still stuck flat on his back, with machines beeping and people waking him up the moment he dropped off to sleep to take his blood pressure.

And the media had found him. Evidently, he was big freaking news. The Ho’omalus had contacted his producer, who contacted his mother and aunt. And somebody had sure as hell alerted the news hounds. He’d awakened this morning to the sight of a perky young thing with a volunteer badge taking his picture with her phone. She’d giggled and scurried out when he protested, but when someone had brought him his phone, there he was, all over Twitter and the goddamn Internet. He was the third most viral video on YouTube.

His mother had phoned and wanted to know if she should fly out to make sure the doctors didn’t kill him. He’d thanked her and told her he’d likely be home to convalesce for a while, so she could baby him then, and no, he was not at death’s door. He was pretty sure he had been on the threshold for a little while, but no need to burden her with that.

And just this morning, his producer had called with the news that the network was thrilled at the publicity of his brush with death at the hands of drug smugglers and a freak storm. Evidently, his fans were besieging the network for news of his recovery and wanted to know when he’d be back on the air, as well. It seemed folks had somehow gotten the idea he and Frank had fought the smugglers off together.

The network would be flying someone out with a contract for next year. Weird.

In fact, everyone had called except the one person he wanted to talk to— Bella. And with all the other calls, he sure as hell knew his cell phone was working.

The polite Hawaiian cops who’d questioned him had told him they’d found a cell phone jamming device in one of the bags of photography equipment abandoned in the caves. Camille had wanted them incommunicado for her little drama to play out, and it had worked.

If it had been only him and Bella, he would have insisted they hike out to escape. But with Frank missing and hurt and the other three nearby, they’d been forced to stay.

Joel’s memories of the culminating battle on the beach were a blur of intense emotions—terror for Bella, helpless rage at Camille and her henchmen, although that might be too fine a word for the scumbags she’d gathered as her bully boys. And sheer, disbelieving horror and wonder at what Bella Moran-Ho’omalu had done.

There was no doubt in his mind that she’d done it. He knew he was as sane as the next guy, and he had seen her, a lovely, sexy slip of a woman wave her arms and literally bring down the Hawaiian forest on a crime boss and her men. Had seen her cripple and kill, with plants as her weapons.

Couldn’t very well tell that to the cops, so he went along with the version of the story they already seemed to have gleaned from Frank, one of their own.

Joel had a vague memory of Bella weeping over him on the beach. And now she didn’t even come and see him in the goddamn hospital. This was the second morning of his captivity—at least that he’d been awake—and he wanted her here.

They’d told him she hadn’t been admitted to the hospital as a patient, and he’d smiled at one of his nurses and inveigled her into calling a friend who knew one of the Ho’omalus and checking on Bella. She was in seclusion with her family; that was all the nurse could find out.

His phone rang, and he grabbed it. It was his producer. Scowling, Joel took the call. “Hey, Randall.”

“Joel, how are you? Any better?”

“I’m lying in a hospital bed in the middle of paradise,” Joel said. “How the hell do you think I am?”

“Ah, grouchy?” the other man quipped. “But I guess that means you’re feeling better, right?”

“No, it means I’m grouchy,” Joel shot back, but he chuckled, and then winced as his wound pulled painfully.

“Well, let me know when that contract gets there, because I want this deal signed and delivered.”

A woman with wavy black hair backed into the room, wearing a short red dress and carrying a box and a big bunch of flowers. She peered down the hall and then stopped to pull the privacy curtain over the doorway.

Joel glanced at her curiously and let his gaze wander down over her heartshaped ass and pretty legs. Then he froze. “I’ll call you back, Randall.” Clicking the phone shut in the middle of his producer’s squawk of protest, Joel dropped the phone. Finally. Pleasure spreading in a warm glow through his chest, he leaned back in the bed and waited.

She turned to face him, clutching the box. It was white, with a big red ribbon. The flowers were mostly red, tropical blooms like the one tucked behind her ear. Like her.

Bella wore sunglasses that hid her eyes, and her mouth was lipsticked in red. She looked like a Hawaiian femme fatale.

“Go ahead and get started,” he invited, lifting an eyebrow at her.

Her eyebrows shot together over the big sunglasses. “Start what?”

“Stripping,” he drawled. “It’s what you did the first time I met you. Do it again now, and we’ve got us a tradition.”

She pursed her lips at him and shook her head, those glossy curls sliding back and forth on the upper slopes of her breasts and catching on the red straps of her halter dress and the tiny little sweater she wore over it. “In your dreams, Girand.”

He nodded. “Oh yeah. Definitely, Princess.”

She smiled and reached up to push her sunglasses up onto her head. Meeting her black velvet gaze, Joel rubbed a hand over his heart, which felt oddly swollen and tender.

“What’s the matter?” she asked, hurrying to his bedside, her eyes full of worry. She dropped the flowers on the foot of his bed. He could smell them, or maybe that was her, that heady combination of sweet and sultry.

“Not a thing,” he assured her, grabbing her hand in his so she couldn’t get away. “You’re just so damn pretty. Even prettier than I remembered, and that was with your clothes off.”

He tugged at her hand, pulling her closer. She shook her head at him. “You look pretty good too, hotshot. Even with that huge bruise on your face, and—and all this stuff.” She indicated the hospital gown and the stiff bandages visible under the thin fabric.

“I look like hell.” He grinned. “They haven’t even let me wash my hair. And I smell like those damn cleansing cloths. But do you think I could have a little kiss anyway?”

She nodded. Then she leaned over and laid a sweet, soft kiss on him that quickly turned hot and wet and deep. She smelled like flowers and sex, and she was warm and silky in his hands, her hair brushing his face as she kissed him, her hands cupping his face and his forearm. She didn’t even seem to mind his smell.

He groaned when she finally pulled away, and closed his eyes. “Oh God, please don’t let me get a hard-on in this little tiny gown,” he muttered.

She snickered, and he opened his eyes, content to smile at her for a moment.

“How you doing, Princess?”

Her gaze turned ebony with intent, her face solemn. “I’m okay. How much do you remember?”

He lifted her hand to his mouth and pressed a kiss in her palm. “I remember a lot,” he told her.

She looked down at their hands, her voice dropping to a near whisper. “We can…talk more about that later, if you like. I don’t want to tire you out too much today.” Pain tinged her gaze. “You…you almost died, Joel.”

“So did you,” he reminded her, his voice equally quiet. “If I’d died, it wouldn’t have been that bullet, baby. Would’ve been because you scared me to death. Taking on a bunch of armed men in a crown of flowers.”

She drew her lower lip under her white teeth, leaving it wet. “Yeah. Kinda surprised myself too.”

“Did you know?” he asked, almost afraid of the answer. “Before that, I mean.”

Bella shook her head. “Not really. I began to wonder, when we landed at Na’alele.” She gave him a quick glance, and her cheeks flushed. “The…the forest speaks to me.”

Joel blinked. Then he rallied, realizing that it had been really difficult for her to share that bit of information with him. “I wondered about that,” he said as calmly as he could. “You can tell me more later. This damn place is too public.”

She nodded, looking relieved. She fussed with his hair, combing it with her fingers, and then pressed another kiss to his cheek, above his four-day beard, and rubbed her fingertips over the bristles. “Carrotty orange. Just like I remembered.”

He grimaced. “I’ll never grow a beard, for sure.” He sighed and felt the hard, light box sitting on his thigh. “You brought me a present?”

She smiled, showing all her teeth. “Yes, I did. Here, open it.”

Joel pulled off the bow, and then opened the box. He peered inside and then gave a hoot of laughter that instantly morphed into a groan of pain. She’d given him a coil of new climbing rope, in her favorite color—red.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she crooned, fluttering over him as he lay back on the bed, wincing. “I’m sorry, Joel. Oh, I should have thought about how laughing would hurt.”

He caught her hand in his. “Bella. Nani—it’s okay. I love the way you make me laugh.”

She bit her lip, still worried. Still his princess, trying to be in charge of everyone’s well-being. “Forgive me?”

“Maybe.”

Her eyes heated, and she leaned closer. “How can I turn that into a yes?”

“Hmm.” He considered. “You could slip that little dress off and let me see what you’re wearing underneath.”

She kissed him, a quick little peck that had him lifting his head for more. “Nope. Like you said, too public here…and I’m not wearing anything but little red panties.”

“Oh, please,” he moaned. “Please, please. Just a peek.”

“Nope.” She kissed him again. “But I will show you my tattoo—one of them, anyway.”

“You got a tattoo?” He stared at her blankly. “That’s what you’ve been doing while I was laid up in here?”

She sobered and chewed her lower lip, her eyes falling to their clasped hands. “No. It’s another…Ho’omalu thing. A gift, from Pele.”

“Ah. From Pele. Like your, ah…specialty.”

“You’re not crazy,” she whispered, evidently seeing something in his eyes that worried her. “You really saw…what you saw.”

He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it. “I know, Princess. It’s okay. I’m not gonna freak on you. I get that your family is…pretty amazing. Being a Ho’omalu means a little more than just having a big family.”

She nodded. “Yes. They are, and yes, it does.”

“Got it. I can wait. But I want to hear it all.”

She smiled. “Okay.”

He smiled back, relieved to see her happy again. “Now can I see your tattoos?”

“Just one.” With a wicked little smile, she lifted one knee onto the bed and pulled her dress up, baring her thigh clear to the crease.

Joel forgot to breathe. The delicate tattoo on her satiny, curving thigh was the sexiest thing he’d ever seen.

“Do you like it?” she asked.

“Hahhhh…” he managed.

She giggled and then whipped her leg off the bed with a little squeak as the curtain slid open behind her.

“Time for your blood-pressure check, Mr. Girand,” chirped the plump Hawaiian nurse. She smiled at Bella and bustled forward.

“You could’ve waited ten minutes,” he told her. “I was just about to get lucky.”

“You were not!” Bella huffed. Joel laughed again and then winced at the pain.

“Ten minutes,” the nurse said sympathetically to Bella. “Is that all? Poor girl.”

The two of them chortled together like best friends while Joel tried to look put out. He was pretty sure he failed, though, because the nurse patted his arm, her eyes twinkling. “Doctor will be around in five minutes. Maybe you can go home tomorrow. Then you get lucky, yeah?”

He certainly hoped so. He watched Bella wander over to the window, enjoying the compact, toned and yet utterly feminine look of her. Maybe he could talk her into riding him, if he promised to lie real still.

“Here, let’s put these in some water.” The nurse picked up the sheaf of flowers and carried them off.

“You could come out to Nawea,” his wahine suggested, turning back to him when the nurse was gone. “And lie around in the shade. Frank would love to see you, and all the Ho’omalus want to meet you.”

“Ah, all of them?” He envisioned a phalanx of tree-size Hawaiian males scowling at him for daring to touch their precious wahine.

“Well, not all,” she said, frowning uncertainly. “My dad and Jason. Jason Mamaloa, his partner.”

“Jason Mamaloa?” Joel whistled. “Wow. I just heard him on the radio. He’s good.”

She smiled as proudly as if he’d praised her. “Isn’t he wonderful? And he’s so nice. I have two dads instead of one.”

He smiled at her. “That’s great. You deserve two.”

“What happened to your father?” she asked, coming back to perch on the side of his bed. He captured her hand again and felt better.

“He died several years ago. He was an alcoholic, finally drank himself to death.”

Her hand gripped his, pressing reassurance in right through his skin. “Oh, I’m sorry, Joel.”

He shrugged. “He was an unhappy, bitter guy. Watched his hardware store go down with the little timber town we lived in. Pine Shadow, Idaho. After the timber industry started to go downhill twenty years ago, with regulation after regulation and cheap foreign lumber, the mill closed. People started to move away for a new start. Not my dad. He was determined to stay and go down with his boots under his favorite barstool, down at the Pine Away. Yes,” he agreed wryly when she blinked. “The real name. Can’t make that shit up.”