Proud Hearts (Wild Hearts Romance Book 2) (12 page)

“No! Well, yeah, they’d be gone, but so would the gigs and the money.”

“And all that makes you happy?”

“Sure.” Being honest with myself came hard, but her direct and steady gaze made it easier. “Or at least it did. It was a rush. Getting what I wanted, who I wanted, any time I wanted it.” I stared into the hollow of my heart. “But all that—it’s like a good movie. It can make you feel it’s all real while it’s right there on the screen. When the movie’s over, you can keep pretending it’s real, find others who’ll pretend with you, but deep down you know it’s nothing more than a celluloid lie. Eventually, you have to admit it to yourself and move on. That, or always be disappointed with life when the real world never measures up to the fantasies on screen.”

“Then why go back to the real world at all?”

I shrugged. “Some folk never do. Some folk are too afraid of the mundanity they see as the real world, so they embrace the lie as truth. Some folk can obfuscate the lie, bury it so deep within them they don’t even remember that it
is
a lie. Until recently, I thought I was one of those too afraid to let go of the lie, too afraid of what I’d find on the other side.”

“What happened?”

“I think I grew up. Then I met you.”

“Me? You’ve known me for four days.”

“How much more time do I need to know who you are? What you do to me? Or are you playing a part too?”

“No part. Of course not. But I don’t understand how I could have anything to do with you wanting to…to what? Give up women? Acting? Hollywood?”

“All of it. And none of it. Acting is what I’m good at. Hollywood? I love the smell of paparazzi in the morning. And women are my inspiration. What I want to do is put the meaningless bits of my life behind me. The casual bits that never add up to fulfillment. I want to be fulfilled. Not that I’ll ever be one of those pretentiously serious actors, but I do want more truth in my acting. I want fans to adore Chris Corsair for being more like the me I want to be.”

“I still don’t see where I play into that.”

“Because of how you can say no.”

“Because I don’t find you irresistible?”

“Because I think you
do
find me irresistible.” I ignored the black look she threw me. “But despite that, you have the integrity of knowing who you are. You don’t have fans and publicists and producers all influencing who you
think
you are. No expectations of what you
should
do. You can follow your own moral compass to happiness. Even if that means denying yourself immediate pleasure, immediate gratification. And that makes you strong. Strong where it counts: in your heart and in your mind. That’s the kind of strength I want. Lately, that’s the kind of strength I need.”

“Need?”

“In here.” I placed my palm over my chest. “Early mid-life crisis, maybe. Maybe just recognition that there’s potentially more to life than camera-mugging and one-night stands. You’ve been reminding me of that. And Caesar cemented it. Seeing him out there, alive, because of something positive and good and unscripted that we did together… That’s fulfillment. That’s meaningful. That’s strong. I want more days like yesterday, more like today.”

There was something else I wanted, but I knew it was too soon to voice it. I wanted—needed—Dee in my arms, in my bed, in my heart. Not for one night. Not for one week. Yet that was all the time we had left.

And if I couldn’t have her beyond a week, should I even try to hold her for a night? Was that fair to her—to me?

She studied me by the light of the camp stove and the starlight that glimmered above. Then very deliberately she set aside the empty tray from her ready meal, rose smoothly, leaned down and placed her lips, soft and full, on mine. Before I could hope the kiss might lead to something more, her lips glided away.

Had I been too quick to find fault with Chris? Had I misjudged him? Had I mistaken confidence in what he wanted and self-acceptance in who he was and his effect on others for the sin of pride? Where exactly was the line between a healthy sense of self-worth and arrogant entitlement?

Had he actually crossed the line, or did my own insecurities amplify and color his actions?

Was it boasting to speak so often of women and ease and physical gratification, or simply insensitive?

And did any of that matter when weighed against what he’d risked to save Caesar?

Maybe I needed to reboot my judgment meter and start over with Chris. Put my own insecurities and biases behind me and give him another chance to impress.

Not that he needed to impress me any further with that body of his that needed no special effects to enhance its attributes or diminish any flaws. Millions of years of gene selection had culminated its efforts in Chris. If evolution stopped with him, the human race would have no reason to complain. I certainly didn’t. It was the reason 90% of the women and 10% of the men gravitated to him. The same chemical cues and social constructs that had built him had hard-wired our lust for him right in.

That still didn’t mean I would be comfortable as one of his conquests. Society had favored monogamy for my ancestors, although the societal drives were never as strong as the natural ones. Sigh as I might after that body of his, melt as I might under the stare of those hot blue eyes of his—even admire his recent actions as I did—I could still never get past a mental image of a different starlet wrapped in those sculpted arms of his each night or of him wrapped in model-perfect legs and pounding away in ecstasy.

So what was my next course of action when my body cried
yes
, my head said
no
, and my heart—my heart was torn between the two, unsure and undecided?

The simple answer, of course, was to give in to my body’s desires and allow myself a few days’ fling. What harm to indulge some of those wild fantasies when he would be gone for good in a week? No commitments, no regrets, just the forever memories and bragging rights of banging a Hollywood star. In some circles, that would make me a star in my own right.

So why was I making this more complicated than it was? It wasn’t like I was some virgin waiting for that special first time, even if it had been just after college and a lifetime ago since I last shared a bed with anyone.

Maybe because I was at that crossroad where he professed to be too, where C&F no longer stood for “casual and fun” but “commitment and future.” Any investment of time and body now had to come with a guarantee of positive return on that investment.

With Chris, there was no future. I wasn’t an actor, so I wouldn’t pretend-act that there was. And while there wasn’t any real harm in casual fun, there was always that hollow feeling when it was over. Trying to keep the hollowness filled was likely what Chris had been doing the past few years. But where he had a city full of opportunity to help him cope, I had only my lion pride and a battery-powered toy.

Would a handful of nights of casual fun really be worth it?

It was after 2 o’clock when I fell asleep at last, unresolved questions still swirling in my head.

It was just after 4 when I woke, sure that
something
had prodded me awake but not sure what. Holding my breath, I listened, not just with my ears but my whole body, making it aware of the pre-dawn dark, feeling for danger—a cobra in my sheets, a leopard in the grass, a baboon in the tree.

My imagination riffled through an entire catalog of dangers. The jackals yapping in the distance wouldn’t have triggered me awake, nor would the owl hooting from above. Nor would the ubiquitous undercurrent of frogs, crickets and locusts that I no longer heard at the conscious level any more unless, like now, I forced myself to hear.

Crawling carefully to the tent flap, hyper-aware of the air around me and on the alert for snakes or millipedes or spiders in the small tent space, I peered out. The half-moon wasn’t quite set, and pale moonshine glinted dully on the stream. I could just make out Caesar, recumbent, head up and ears perked.

Whatever it was, he’d heard it too.

When it sounded again, I couldn’t decide whether to cry or laugh my relief, although I prudently smothered both.

Brutus’ unmistakable
whuff whuff
carried through the night. Maybe somewhere between half a mile and a mile away to the north and east. Grabbing the handheld and my .38, I slipped out of the tent to set up the tripod.

“What’s going on?” Chris’ voice was low and hushed in deference to the pre-dawn quiet.

“We don’t have to find our pride.” I grinned. “They’ve found us.”

“What? They’re coming here?”

“
He
certainly hopes so.” I nodded toward the cub who was staring intently to the northeast.

“What do we do?”

“We get in the Range Rover and watch.”

“You think they’ll come into camp?”

My heart beat fast with anticipation.

“God, I hope so! Don’t you?”

I ran a hand through my mussed hair to tame it as I climbed into the front passenger seat. Dee slid into the seat behind me, tossing the tranq gun beside her and wedging the tripod into the space where her door stood ajar. She passed me the handheld.

Caesar
whuffed
again, and this time one of the lionesses answered, much closer now.

Even as I strained to see in the dark, Dee tossed me the cable end of a spotlight she pulled out from under my seat. The keys followed. Roomy though the cab was, it was a trick maneuvering my big frame over the gearshift console into the driver seat so I could start the engine to keep the battery from draining. Then it was back again into the passenger seat leaving the engine humming and plugging in the spotlight.

Outside, by the stream, the cub struggled to his feet.

Moments later, Cleo bounded into sight, almost knocking her brother over with her enthusiastic head butts and butt slaps. She rolled by his feet and swatted at his tufted tail, clearly delighted by the reunion.

Portia and Sheba came next, each brushing jaw-to-jaw and cheek-to-cheek with Caesar, less exuberant than Cleo’s greeting, but certainly no less delighted to be reunited.

“Brutus and Nana,” Dee whispered as she swung the lens to catch their regal entrance.

They paid little heed to the wayward cub, satisfied simply that he’d been found. The rest of the camp, though… now that was a curiosity worthy of their attention. The camp stove teetered under Brutus’ investigation, his nose toppling it. Startled by its fall, he cuffed at it, sending it sliding, right before the swish of his tail upended one the lightweight canvas camp chairs.

Meanwhile, Nana stuck her head in Dee’s tent and dragged out an unrolled sleeping bag, snuffling at it, inhaling Dee’s familiar scent. Next, she looked toward the Rover. I kept the light from the spot off her directly so as not to frighten her, and in the soft edge of it that fell over her, her gaze swept right past me, dismissing me, while settling on Dee’s half-face above the camera.

With slow, deliberate steps, Nana padded the short distance to the Rover, abandoning the sleeping bag halfway to us. From the corner of my eye, I caught Dee’s subtle movements as she tucked herself behind the safety of the camera and the steel of the partially opened door. Not that either would provide any real measure of safety, of course, if Nana decided they didn’t.

When Nana stuck her nose directly into the camera’s lens, I felt the thrill of her 300-pound presence almost within reach. Up close, it was easy to see the flaws that distance mellowed or hid completely. The dullness of her coat. Missing patches of fur where the naked skin had darkened over. The wave of her rib bones and the sharp ridges of her cheeks.

Up close, her age couldn’t be ignored.

Not that she wasn’t still dangerous, maybe just less dangerous than her daughter Sheba who crowded in as well. The handheld caught a look of understanding that crackled with near-tangible intensity between Nana and Dee. Satisfied, Nana allowed Sheba to nudge her way in as she moved off to join Brutus, who’d wandered to the far front of the Rover, sniffing bumper and tires.

Sheba wove her long, muscled body against the edge of the door and the tripod. Dee steadied the camera assembly with her left hand. Her right snaked between the legs of the tripod and tickled Sheba’s ribs as she wove by.

The touch didn’t even seem to startle her as Dee’s bold hand trailed over her haunches. When her tail flipped by, she whipped around and repeated on the other side.

I was busy capturing the touch of Dee’s hand on Sheba and the heart-melting smile on Dee’s face when an unexpected
thump
rocked the Rover.

Only the sharks bumping against the open-barred cage I had been in had made my heart race like the unexpected sight of Brutus’ wide eyes staring at me through the windshield. His great face, framed by his heavy, dark mane, filled the window. He batted a paw bigger than my hand at the glass, testing it.

With great disappointment, I imagined, that I wouldn’t be an easy breakfast, he leapt from the hood to the roof of the Rover. My stomach flopped with a sickening thought.

“Close your door! Now!” I kept my voice low, but made sure Dee wouldn’t miss the urgency in it. If Brutus tried to come through from the top of her half-open door there was no human muscle in the world that could stop him. “Don’t think. Just do it!”

Too late.

A tawny paw dipped down in the open space above the camera. Dee backpedaled in the seat, reaching for the rifle beside her.

What was she thinking? There’d be no room to aim and fire the air gun with a lion on top of her.

“The .38!” I hissed.

With a sharp metallic
pop
she unloaded the dart and dropped the rifle. A blue dart. The one I’d loaded earlier. Half-dose for an adult lion.

Through the window on the far side, Nana stalked into view. No escape out that side or the passenger side now.

Brutus’ big nose dipped into view from the top.

Dee broke the dart, extracting the hypodermic from the delivery system. The only way she could use it now was to stab the needle in and push the plunger herself. In these close quarters she might—might—have a fraction of a chance to stop him before he savaged her.

Dropping the handheld on the dash, I lunged through the narrow opening between the front seats and mauled her myself, flipping her right hip toward me where I could grab the .38 from its belt holster.

Brutus gave the top of the tripod a tentative tap. It teetered beside Sheba’s head. She snarled up at Brutus.

He swiped his paw toward her, not so much a threat as a reminder who had the most power here.

Pity the human husband who would try that. Weight and strength gave Brutus an advantage in a fight, but they had little to do with social power.

Unintimidated, Sheba raked her claws along the top of the door frame as she swiped back.

Brutus’ paw retreated, and the Rover rocked as he shook himself on top of the roof, the metallic scrabbling of his claws echoing loud inside the cab. With a final
whump
, Brutus leapt down to join Nana on the far side, only his ears and a fluff of mane visible through the driver’s window.

That left Sheba still at the open door with no way for Dee to shut it. I eased my way toward the driver’s seat, cursing under my breath at the gearshift and map box console in between.

“Don’t,” Dee whispered, her eyes locked on Sheba.

“I’m gonna get us the hell out of here.”

“No. Wait.”

Sheba snuffled at Dee’s safari boot. She stretched her neck to follow the line of Dee’s shapely leg and swiped her tongue over the smooth, bare calf above. Another stretch and she was nuzzling Dee’s knee, her well-muscled neck, smooth cheeks, and teeth barely more than the width of the seatback between her and me.

The edge of the chassis’ floorboard cut into Sheba’s chest as she strained her neck further forward, but her limit had been reached unless she actually took a step in.

“Sheba,” Dee whispered and the lioness’ ears swiveled at the familiar voice, familiar name. She grunted.

Slowly, Dee reached out her free hand—the one without the hypo. Save for an equally slow repositioning of the handheld, I didn’t move, although I held the .38 as ready as the camera—as ready as Dee held the tranquilizer.

Trust
. Apparently neither of us believed it should be freely given.

Enthralled, I watched the elegant dance of Dee’s fingers as they touched the underside of Sheba’s aquiline jaw and began scratching her lightly under the chin. The lioness seemed as surprised as us at the touch, her expression flowing swiftly from high alert to a delicate lift of her head for better access and eyes half-closed with contentment.

If it hadn’t been for Brutus rearing suddenly against the far door, his massive face filling the window as he peered in and growled at Dee’s head not a foot from his with only the pane of glass between, the moment with Sheba might have gone on.

Clearly annoyed by Brutus’ antics, the lioness’ expression was back on high alert. She snarled at him, and for a moment I thought she would lunge at him across the bench seat, without care for what would happen to Dee when 300-plus pounds of lioness came crashing down on her.

Instead, Sheba seemed to get the concept Brutus was on the
other
side of that clear barrier. With a priceless look of exasperation, caught forever by the camera, she backed out of the Rover and out of the open door, propelling gracelessly away and nearly toppling the tripod with her shoulder as she went.

Clear of the vehicle, she raced around its back and leapt on Brutus, her strong forelegs circling his neck as she tried to bring him down by momentum and weight alone. For all its ferociousness, even I could tell the take-down attempt was only half-hearted, not the act of a skilled hunter but the behavior of a frustrated mate getting her point across. Brutus easily shook her off and snarled a reply, but for the second time it was clear he had gotten her meaning. Scraping his dignity together, he padded off a few yards beyond the camp as though the idea to move on was his alone.

With a weary
What am I going to do with him?
look, Nana followed.

I was torn, the emotional part of me hoping Sheba would return to us, the rational part advising Dee to, “Shut the door.”

It wasn’t necessary. Sheba circled the Rover and headed back to the stream where the rest of the family had settled down. Portia was diligently cleaning her male cub’s wounds while Cleo snuggled next to her brother licking his ear. Sheba stretched out beside them, lazily flicking her tail as the sky began to brighten.

It was gloriously clear—the pride had found their new home.

Only…

“Uh,” I pointed out, “we have a predicament.”

Not everyone who’d almost been eaten by lions would have grinned with as much goodwill as Dee did. “If by predicament you mean a full-bore, lady-or-the-tiger, life-or-death type problem, then yeah, I agree—we do.”

“They’re not going to leave, are they?” Brutus and Nana had taken an interest in the supply tent and were snuffling at the canvas sides, no doubt drawn by the odor of the boxed and foil-wrapped and therma-sealed packages of ready meals stacked within. “Hey, my wallet!” Everything I needed to get back to the States was in it—passport, work permits, travelers checks, credit cards. If I couldn’t get back to my tent before the lions got to it… “What if I sat on the horn? Would that scare them away?”

“Maybe for a little while. But they’d still come back for the cub. Once he can travel, they might move on.”

“And until then?”

“Keep filming? It’s not like we’re stranded. We can always scare the lions away long enough to pack up the necessities, then head into town. Or since Reena’s leaving, we can wait until after Gary sees her off and have him bring in new tents and more supplies so we can set up a new camp in a less-crowded neighborhood.”

“You seem remarkably calm about all of this.”

“Not really,” Dee confessed. “I have to pee.”

“I can do you one better. I really, really need to tweet about this.”

She laughed, probably more from relief, but the fluting sound did something warm and good to me. I wanted to keep her laughing forever.

On impulse, I worked my way into the backseat. Dee graciously scooted over behind the passenger seat that I’d neglected to slide forward so left less leg room on that side. Of course, the tripod was on that side, too, but I liked the idea of her being gracious over practical much more.

She righted the tilted tripod while I transferred the air rifle to the front.

“You okay?” I had plenty of witty opening lines at my disposal, but none were as sincere.

“Are you kidding? Did you see the way Sheba defended me and came to me after? Like I was one of her own.”

“Yeah, but Brutus…”

“Was being a big, curious oaf. If he’d wanted to hurt me, he would have, Sheba or not. He doesn’t know how to be gentle. The lionesses kept him away from the cubs until they were big enough to get away on their own. Not because he would intentionally hurt them, but his idea of play was to maul them around, often with his claws half-unsheathed. So Portia and Sheba took away his play privileges.”

Her expression turned suddenly serious. “Are
you
okay?”

“Hey, I’m Chris Corsair. Adventurer Extraordinaire. Of course I’m okay. Just maybe not as confident that Brutus was simply being curious as you seem to be.”

She smiled at me then and unexpectedly took my hand, her slender fingers warm against my skin. “But you stayed cool—didn’t shoot, didn’t freak. Best of all, you didn’t interfere.”

“So you respect me for being a coward and doing nothing.”

She squeezed my hand. “Hardly. Panicking would have been easy. Shooting easier still for some men who think guns are what give them power and authority to act. You weren’t doing nothing. You were watching, waiting, assessing. You were prepared. I knew—
knew
—you’d be right there if things had gotten out of hand. Sometimes trusting is the bravest thing we can do.” Her eyes glistened in the brightening dawn. “There was a lot of trust here today. And because we let that trust play out, some amazing rewards for it as well. Thank you for trusting.”