Make Mine a Marine (32 page)

When he straightened, he stood beside her, with his broad, smooth, beautiful chest positioned scant inches from the tip of her nose. Sarah blinked rapidly, temporarily forgetting her concerns and her reason for coming here in the first place.

An animal urge to nuzzle his chest, to lean into him and test the smell and dampness of his skin, sprung upon her unawares. With a monumental effort, she thought of Doris and Millie and their prim, ladylike ways. Grasping that slim straw of propriety, she turned away and crossed to the back of the tent.

"Would you put on a shirt? Please?" Was that husky little quaver part of her own voice?

Keeping her back turned, she blushed at the colorful oath that slipped from his lips, then listened to a rummaging sound as he sorted through items in his duffel bag. She heard a whispered rasp of material, and a few moments later his dark voice penetrated her mental image of him dressing behind her. "All right."

Breathing easier, Sarah turned around and could have kicked herself. Maybe the one thing more distracting than Hawk's naked chest was the sight of that chest encased in tight black cotton. The clinging softness of his T-shirt only accentuated what it covered, and instead of overlooking his sexy dimensions, she busied herself imagining and remembering what lay underneath.

Treating herself like a recalcitrant pupil who continued to stare out the window while the teacher lectured, she quickly chastised herself. She tipped her chin up and practically clicked her heels together, stiffening her posture to near attention. "Are you feeling better?"

"Better?" He'd also pulled on his military fatigues and was now in the process of tucking his shirt into the waistband.

His perfunctory movements eased her nervous awareness. He clearly felt no similar attraction to her, so mooning over his body was a wasted effort. Remembering that made it easier to talk to him. "Earlier this evening in the tomb, you weren't yourself. It was like you'd taken a drug. I thought there might be poisonous gas. Maybe the tomb isn't safe for the girls."

"It isn't safe." He tucked the knife behind his back and sat down to pull on his socks and boots. He did spare her one direct glance. "And no, I don't take drugs."

She felt the sting in his voice. She'd meant only to suggest a comparison for his behavior, not make an accusation. "I know you don't," she said by way of apology, believing him.

The tension in his shoulders eased a fraction. But his first warning still bothered her. Sarah frowned and set the lantern on the floor, hiding his face in otherworldly shadows. "Why isn't it safe?"

The silence that followed engulfed the tent, making it hard for Sarah to breathe. Then, in one swift movement, Hawk snatched her wrist and pulled her down on the cot beside him. He let go immediately, but the bottomless pool of night in his eyes pinned her there and kept her from moving away.

"I sense things." He released the words haltingly, as if saying them aloud created an unpleasant taste on his tongue. "I'm aware of things that other people often overlook."

Sarah looked at his face. On first meeting him, she might have described it as expressionless. But here in the shadows, after three days in his presence, after watching him with a fascination that bordered on obsession, she realized he revealed a great deal with his eyes. Right now they were pleading. Desperate. Wary. He wanted to share something with her, and yet she sensed he wasn't comfortable sharing this with anybody.

A thought struck her.  "Are you telepathic? Can you read people's minds?"

His straight lips curved in the trace of a smile. Her intuition pleased him. "Not exactly. I read emotions. Histories. I can see past events that shape people's actions, and"—he hesitated—"I get impressions of future events."

"You read auras?"

"Yes." His smile broadened but didn't reach his eyes.

That explained the kiss. That explained why he showed up when Salazar had abandoned her. But that didn't explain…"So did you sense something in the tomb?"

He spread his hands across his knees and inhaled deeply, bracing himself for the next revelation. "I am what's called a shaman. A spirit master. Not only do I interpret the living spirits of the earth, but I can communicate with the spirits beyond."

"Ghosts?"

"More of an awareness rather than any physical manifestation. A temporary possession as a means of communication. There's a presence there in the tomb. Someone who's very unhappy. Very angry."

While she believed in psychic phenomena to some degree—after all, there were times when she'd thought her mother, deep in the throes of her cruelest pain, had communicated her subconscious needs to her. And occasionally she still felt the wise, comforting presence of her father. But there were limits to what explanations she could accept.

Sarah shot to her feet, angry with herself for listening and giving credence to Hawk's wild story. "An evil spirit possessed you? That's why you tried to strangle me? Why you kissed me? So it wasn't you who put his paws all over me, but some horny, unhappy dead guy?"

Hawk stood and closed his hands around her elbows. "I'm not sure when I snapped out of it, but I knew what I was doing when I kissed you. I'm sorry I didn't realize it sooner."

Sarah jerked away. "Keep your hands off me!"

The vehemence in her voice and the force of her movements froze him to the spot. Sarah grabbed the lantern and stomped to the door. He hadn't even turned when she spun around and jabbed a finger at him. "That will never happen again! Do you understand?"

She dropped her hand and ranted on in a softer, more cutting tone. "I have a reputation to consider. That kiss was a mistake. I wouldn't want the girls to think something was going on between us. That's hardly appropriate behavior for a chaperon."

"It won't happen again." If she weren't so angry, if she didn't feel so foolish for believing in him, she might have noticed the dead quality in his voice.

"It had better not." There. She'd made the point she wanted to. She should feel triumphant. Relieved. Instead she only felt miserable. But she couldn't back down now. Everyone expected her to fail on this trip, and by indulging some of her wild fantasies about Hawk she'd nearly done so. "I don't want to hear any crazy talk around the girls, either. Luis has spooked them enough. They think you're some kind of hero who's going to protect them. But you're not, are you?"

Hawk faced her then, and the bleak look in his eyes nearly stopped her.

The harsh edge seeped from her voice. "You're just some crazy man who carries a big knife and spouts nonsense about evil and dead spirits. And I was stupid enough to
…"

To what? Believe in him? Care about him? Want him?

"I'm not crazy." He said it like a fact she should believe. She almost did. "And you're not stupid to be afraid of me."

Sarah laughed, a joyless sound that got sucked up by the tent's thick air. "I was more comfortable with the noxious-gas theory."

"I can't promise it won't happen again. Sometimes, even with my abilities, I can't control the will of the spirits." When she realized how hard he looked at her, she listened to the call of his eyes and met his gaze. "But I can promise to keep my hands to myself, if that's what you want."

"I
…It's for the best." That was what she wanted, wasn't it? Sarah struggled to remember why it was so important to keep her distance from Hawk.

"It's not what I want." His soft voice caressed her with a promise that left her feeling raw and unsettled. "I'm not sorry I kissed you. I'm only sorry I hurt you because of it."

I'm not sorry?
Wasn't he embarrassed? Disappointed?

If he was an honest man—and crazy people spoke exactly what they felt, didn't they?—then the idea that he truly wanted to kiss her warmed her like a hug.

Don't worry, sweetie, I'll still have sex with you. I want to have kids.
Walter's voice intruded, a shameful reminder that overshadowed the healing kindness in Hawk's voice.

Seizing that reality, she managed a civil smile. "Then if we understand each other, I'll say good night."

"Sarah?" He moved a step closer, but he stopped when she put up a hand.

"Good night, Hawk."

She escaped from the oppressive confines of the tent into the oppressive humidity outside. Walking down the path, she considered her own foolishness. Her anger with Hawk had more to do with her own embarrassment than with any real suspicions about his character. She didn't really think he was crazy. He just had some crazy ideas. And she honestly believed he sensed people's emotions. Look at how accurately he read her desire and anger and self-doubt.

Lord, she was a fool! A plain, uptight, inexperienced fool. She should learn from Walter's example and just give up on men. She didn't understand them. She didn't know how to handle them. Why the heck did she think she needed one?

Why did she think she needed Hawk?

The thought stopped her in her tracks. Somewhere along the line, her attraction to the man had deepened into some sort of emotional attachment. A hunger that went deeper than physical desire.

"Talk about crazy," she chided herself.

When she shook her head and stepped forward again, a figure materialized out of the shadows, blocking her path. Looking up, she saw that it was no spirit, but a man. A slick-haired, slitty-eyed, sweat-stained man with a leering smile. Martín de Vega.

He reached out and touched her cheek with the tips of two grimy fingers.

"Tomorrow night, Señorita Sarah, you will visit
my
tent?"

Chapter Five

A prickle of unease touched Hawk's mind the way a cool breeze would raise the hairs on the back of his neck. It was the same awareness that had kept him and the men in his rescue/recon unit alive more than once in the past. He wasn't sure he trusted that instinct anymore. But a soldier's training had been ingrained in him since childhood, and, doubtful or not, he'd grown too used to listening to that keen sixth sense to ignore it.

He retied his boot, buttoned the fly of his khakis, and wondered why he'd gone to so much trouble getting dressed after midnight. He'd jumped from his cot earlier, fortified by only his underwear and his knife, braced to surprise the intruder who'd strayed so far from camp.

He'd known it was Sarah before he opened the tent flap. When her guard was down, she broadcast her spirit like a beacon, a connecting signal strengthened by her appearance in his vision. His mind had leaped to all sorts of conclusions—none of them very comforting. There'd been an accident. Martin had gone after the girls. That hateful, waking presence in the tomb had managed to escape and find a way to stalk Sarah.

But no, she just wanted to talk.

Hawk sighed in utter frustration with the woman and closed his eyes, tuning his senses to the impression that had alerted him through the darkness.

She'd come to him, determined yet delicate, daring yet afraid, and said she wanted to talk. Her hair fell freely in a caramel-colored cascade around her shoulders and back, with the ends of it drawing his eye to the sensuous earth-woman flare of her hips.

He still felt raw from fighting off that damned demon that had tried to possess him, and she'd traipsed in, wide-eyed and vulnerable, spouting self-righteous nonsense about his inappropriate kiss while staring at his chest as if she wanted to devour him.

Her aura spoke of desire, but her words were all cold business. He tried to respect the conscious choice of the people he read when their words didn't match their emotions.

But it was damn hard to watch Sarah struggling to conquer an overwhelming physical need while she talked like a prude. Especially since he wanted to hold her again, to see if her response was as incendiary as he remembered, or if his memory of her untutored, unrestrained kiss was a feverish exaggeration of his demented mind.

She wanted him to maintain an impersonal distance. He knew it was the right thing to do. She had a reputation to protect with her students, and he needed to concentrate on the potential danger at hand. But then she did that shy, stammering thing and triggered a protective urge to swallow her up in his arms and make whatever frightened her go away.

Except
he
was the thing that frightened her.

So instead of telling her to get lost, or touching her again, he put on all his clothes and tried to reassure her of his good intentions that way. But if she didn't learn to douse the hungry look in her eyes, he wouldn't be able to stay away from her.

"Damn." He offered the curse as barter for his tormented soul and left the tent.

Extraneous thoughts vanished when he saw the light through the trees. Unmoving. Sarah had stopped on the path not far from her tent. Was it another spider? A snake?

Or something equally loathsome?

He heard the raspy whisper of a man's voice. "Do not worry about the strange one. My friends and I, we will show you the hospitality of Tenebrosa."

Silent as a jaguar, Hawk crept closer. He felt Sarah shudder when Martin de Vega stroked his fingers across her cheek. An unexpected rush of possessive anger surged through him.  He balled his hand into a fist, but relaxed it almost immediately.

Thus far, he'd shown himself to be paranoid and unable to control his own actions. Much as she cringed away from de Vega's flirtations, Hawk doubted Sarah would appreciate any more demonstrations of violence.

He was an able enough fighter, but his best skill lay in the element of surprise. His uncanny knowledge could spook an enemy into making a mistake, rendering Hawk an intimidating victor.

Materializing out of the shadows directly behind Sarah achieved the intended result. Startled, de Vega jerked his hand away from her face. Even Sarah jumped at his low-pitched voice.

"Go back to the pit you crawled out of and leave the lady alone."

De Vega spread his legs in the time-honored stance of a man expecting a fight. Not much taller than Sarah herself, he preened with all the false bravado of a bantam rooster. "Luis says she does not belong to you."

Hawk answered in Spanish, sparing Sarah the harsh words, though she could probably pick up the gist of his threat from de Vega's response. With his bottom lip already curled in a perpetual snarl, Martin contorted his face with downturned lines of contempt. Hawk never so much as blinked. The lowlife quaked in his sandals, imparted his low opinion of Hawk's parentage, then turned and scurried back toward the main camp.

Hawk didn't slacken his battle-ready pose until he saw Sarah's shoulders lift and sag with a gut-deep sigh. "Are you all right?" he asked.

Slowly she turned and tilted those big green-gold eyes up at him. "What did you say to him?"

"The most polite translation I'll give is that if he touches you again, I'll give him a taste of my hospitality."

He felt the premonition a split second before her words struck him. It was too late to brace for the brunt of her ingratitude. "Great. Now he'll hit on the girls."

"Excuse me?" He wasn't so full of himself as to expect a thank-you, but the thinly veiled reprimand took him by surprise. "You want me to ignore your fear of the man?"

"That doesn't matter. The girls' safety comes first. If he's occupied with me, then he's not bothering them."

"He'll bother them
and
you if he thinks he can get away with it." He bent his knees, facing her at her level, matching her defiant stance. "He's not the kind of man who's satisfied with one woman. It doesn't have to be you. It's a game. He wants to score whenever and however he can. I just told him you weren't available to play."

The fire bled from her eyes. He didn't need any damn gift to see the color draining from her face. Something he'd said had triggered a hurt, a painful memory or fear that knocked the fight right out of his feisty she-bear.

"What did I say?" he asked, more concerned by her 180-degree turn in self-assurance than by de Vega's lecherous threat.

"Stop doing that!" Tension fluttered across her expression and landed in the grim set of her beautiful mouth. He'd seen that look before, dozens of times. It was the disgust of someone realizing the full scope of his bizarre talents. The denial of the man because the powers wouldn't go away. "It's an invasion of privacy. I feel like I'm being violated."

Hawk jerked back as though she'd slapped him. He'd dropped his guard with Sarah, and this was payback time. He'd been steering toward this kind of censure right from the start. He shouldn't expect her to be any different from the rest of the world. In her mind, he rated no better than de Vega or that preppy boyfriend of hers back home. The distinction wasn't lost on him.

Stoic silence had been his ally for many years. He straightened to his full height and watched Sarah back off as the difference in size and demeanor between them registered. He didn't care, he told himself. He didn't care what Sarah thought of him. He was here to do a job, not to play bodyguard-slash-whipping boy to a naive, virginal schoolmarm from Smalltown, U.S.A., who was so far out of her element that he might have laughed if he could allow himself the liberty of mirth.

"I'll try to remember that," he muttered, turning away from the abhorrence he'd heard in her voice and the black spot of heartsick pain he saw in the wavering light surrounding her.

"Miss Mack! Miss Mack!"

Pounding footsteps crashed down the path toward them. Hawk stopped as the two girls approached, but he didn't move any closer. He recognized Colleen Walks-a-Deer immediately, and had learned that the older girl's name was Denise.

"What is it?" Sarah glanced at her watch and frowned, apparently forgetting or ignoring her new aversion to him.

"Lyndsay's missing," said Denise. "She said she was going to the latrine over an hour ago. Then the rain hit. She hasn't come back. We went to look for her, but the generator wasn't even turned on to power up the lights there. We can't find her."

"Did you check Andrea and Lynnette's tent?"

Denise nodded. "They're out looking for her now."

Damn foolishness!
Hawk barged into the conversation uninvited. "Did they stay on the path?" He stepped up to Sarah's elbow. "The predators come out at night. A novice can get turned around even in the daylight. At night, if your girls stray away from the influence of man, they'll be sitting ducks for one of the big cats."

Sarah looked up at him with barely checked fear clouding her eyes. "I'm more worried about where Martin's been the past hour."

Hawk felt his self-controlled resentment fading. She might not appreciate his chivalric attempts to defend her, but she'd sacrifice pride and principle when it came to protecting her charges. "His clothes were dry when he talked to you. He'd have been soaked to the skin if he were up to mischief earlier."

"He could have done something to her and then changed."

"Let's not panic yet." Hawk squeezed her shoulder, then wondered if she hated his physical touch as much as she despised his extrasensory contact. He pulled away and primed himself to do what he used to do best. Take the point. Find the objective, then relay the information back to base.

He'd failed on just such a mission once before, but he didn't see the need to share that information with Sarah. She already had enough doubts about him to dissuade her trust. He pointed to Colleen and Denise. "You two find Andrea and Lynnette, then go back to your tent and stay put. We don't need to lose track of anyone else."

"But we can help," argued Denise. "Wouldn't more eyes make it easier to find her?"

In daylight or on familiar ground, that might have been a sensible offer. But there was nothing familiar about the night on Tenebrosa. "What I foresee are more footprints wiping out whatever trail the rain hasn't already destroyed."

He was thankful when Sarah backed him up on this. "Hawk's right. Find the others and stay in your tent. Give a loud holler if Lyndsay shows up before we get back."

With a groan that was a mixture of worry and teenage whine at not being treated as adults, the two girls returned to camp. When Sarah stepped toward the fire pit instead of her own tent, Hawk snagged her by the elbow and stopped her midstride.

"We?"

"She's my responsibility."

"You got turned around in the jungle yourself. You have no business searching for Lyndsay."

She pulled away and made a sweeping gesture around the campsite. "I can't just sit here and do nothing."

"You can follow your own advice." Hawk kept his tone soft and authoritative, the way he often did when advising a patient. "Stay put so I don't worry about you. I need you here to keep everyone else in line. I'll find her as quick as I can and bring her back. I promise."

Her eyes flickered in the glow of the lantern and she hesitated. Maybe she doubted the reliability of those last two words as much as he did.

"I know you will," she whispered, surprising him with her humble faith in him.

Hawk reached out then and cupped her cheek, ignoring her request to keep anything personal out of their relationship. Like a territorial male instead of the enlightened man he sought to be, he cradled the very cheek de Vega had stroked earlier, putting his stamp on Sarah and canceling out the other man's touch.

He lingered a moment when she didn't flinch away or flay him with her tongue, and basked in the healing beauty of her timid smile. He didn't have the words to thank her for the simple trust, and he couldn't ask her to believe in him unconditionally, but for now it was enough that she entrusted him with this.

"Stay here," he ordered, closing his fingers into his fist and pulling away, knowing he had to ignore his longings at this moment. "Keep the others safe."

Sarah nodded and Hawk strode across the compound to Lyndsay's tent. The mud immediately outside the flap had been smushed into a pulp of unrecognizable tracks. Undaunted, Hawk circled the tent until he found what he was looking for—a single boot print, intact beneath the sheltering overhang of a tree root. Hawk allowed himself the slightest of smiles. Barring catastrophe, Lyndsay was as good as found.

Sarah watched Hawk stoop and touch something on the ground. Then he pulled a flashlight from that curious vest of his and vanished into the jungle. She marveled at his supreme self-assurance, and understood how, as a soldier, he would inspire confidence in the men who served with him.

His ability to sense her emotions, robbing her of a well-used shield that normally allowed her to distance herself from uncomfortable situations, still unnerved her. But that particular talent didn't worry her as much as his deep-rooted penchant toward gallantry. He was a protector by nature, a man who made restitution when he inflicted a hurt. A man who treated her like a lady of value, a woman of desire.

Despite her bold, commonsense arguments to the contrary, she craved his touch, whether it was the untamed passion that made her forget who she was, or the gentle reassurance of his hand on her shoulder or face. She could quickly get used to Hawk's protection and kindness, and knew they could become dangerous addictions.