Proud Hearts (Wild Hearts Romance Book 2) (17 page)

Wrapped inside and around each other, we fell asleep, our hatch open still to the wilds of fate, trusting to our pride to keep us safe.

It might have been the chatter from the night birds in our tree that woke Dee and me a couple of hours later. But it wasn’t.

It was
need
.

Need as deep and primal as Africa itself.

Need that burned through our flesh like a fire on the veldt, leaving any thought of refusal ash in its wake.

I was already inside her when we woke. Half-hard only, so I’d probably never pulled out. If this craving had its way, I never would. We fit together tighter than fate. With only a subtle shift of my hips, I was lengthening again, hardening, readying.

The pillow of her thighs tightened around me as her lips fell over the lobe of my ear and she sucked gently. I filled my hands with her breasts, rubbing their peaks till she moaned.

Responsibility was inconvenient, but it was the work of only a moment to slip out and slip on a fresh condom. Then I was back inside her, pulsing with a slow, steady need. Where our first time had been more frantic, a quick slaking, this time we moved in time with the rhythm of the night—the slow slide of the moon across the sky, the slow circle of stars overhead.

Even the why of us coming together this time was different from that first frenzied encounter. A need that had less to do with sex and more to do with life. With—

No, I wasn’t prepared to voice the “L” word, not even in the private nooks of my mind.

Giving myself over to the stateliness of this dance, I let my hands roam the ways and byways of Dee’s exquisite body, memorizing every silken plane and hollow that made her unique. Nature had been kind to her, although Nature had reserved legginess and bustiness for others. Such generosity wouldn’t have fit her, in any case. Just as she needed no surgeon’s knife to sculpt her more perfectly into the woman she was. Her very naturalness called to me, and my hands found no flaws as they explored their way across her.

“You’re so lovely,” I murmured. There were other lines I could have used, scripted by gifted playwrights, memorized as they were from countless movies and plays; instead, I chose the words of my heart.

When she stiffened, I realized she doubted me. Realized she was comparing herself to the women the tabloids had paired me with.

“Really, you are,” I assured her. “The way every part of you fits against me so perfectly. The way your skin shimmers in the moonlight. Even the way those dark eyes of yours judge me, because they make me see myself more clearly. The way you move. The way you kiss. The way my hands don’t want to leave you. The way I want to just stay inside you forever.”

She shook her head, but I wouldn’t let her deny it. Capturing her lips with mine, I kissed her, long and deep, searing her with the truth of my words until she kissed me back, believing them.

Stirred, I moved inside her, the beat of the dance more insistent now, never forgetting while there was joy in the dance itself, every
pas de deux
led to a finale.

“Christopher Darnelle,” she whispered, “I think I like you.”

Squeezing her to me, the tempo of our lust beating faster, I proved how much I liked her right back.

The next time I woke it was dawn, and I felt a soft tickle at my ankle. Our legs twined, Dee’s foot was sleepily brushing mine. Or so I thought until I opened my eyes.

“Shh.” I didn’t need Dee’s caution, but it did help to steady me as I watched Sheba continue to snuffle at our bare legs.

Not taking her eyes off the lioness, Dee reached into the mesh sidepocket of the bay. For a moment I thought she going for the .38, but she drew out Reena’s handheld, her spare now, and began to film as she sing-songed nonsense to keep Sheba reassured.

After a moment, the lioness seemed to have gained all the useful information she could through her sensitive nose. Whether she could scent my fear or hear the pound of my heart, I couldn’t be sure, but I used all the tricks I knew to minimize the outward signs of my trepidation and to display confidence—both for the lion and the camera. Sheba swung her head away from us, and I was about to sigh my relief when she sprang easily over the lip of the hatch into the narrow space beside where Dee and I lay twined together.

I froze, feeling even more naked as the lioness lowered her head between us, her whiskers twitching across my pecs and Dee’s breast. Camera in her right hand, Dee cautiously extended her left, burying her fingers in the fur at the back of Sheba’s head and scratching her ear.

Beside my own head, a great paw spraddled in the bedding, not a handwidth away from my cheek. Her claws were retracted, but their wicked hooks peeked out, a solid threat that she had only to swipe in play at one of our heads or arms or bared butts to ravage flesh that was as tender and unprotected as our own.

Twisting her head away from Dee’s hand, she butted her muzzle into the curve of my waist. I expected a shock of cold, but her nose was pleasantly warm. Tentatively, I lifted a hand and scratched her cheek, the short fur a mix of soft and rough depending on how I stroked it. A moment of that, then she turned lithely in that cramped space, whipping her tail into our faces before leaping out of the bay and sauntering back to the stream where the rest of the lions lay watching with lazy interest.

Dee laughed, a sound half-nervous and half-delight. “I guess that was her saying good morning.”

“Or asking what we were up to last night.” Was that really a blush on Dee’s cheeks? I smiled. The color—and the reason for it—suited her. “Or what we might be up to still this morning.”

I expected a deeper blush. What I got was a full-frontal sweep of the camera before she clicked it off abruptly and dropped it back into the sidepocket of the bay.

“And what do you think we told her?” Dee’s voice was breathy and husky. I knew what that told me.

“This.” I rolled her on top of me and tossed her a fresh, vanilla-scented packet. With a growl, she tore it open with her teeth.

Two days ago, Gary had accompanied the ambulance that transported Reena from the small hospital where we’d left them to a resort about 150 miles south in the larger city of Mongu where they could catch a commercial airline without the need to puddle hop out of Zambezi.

The move added about four hours extra to our drive, which was in its way as charged as the fire-chase across the veldt had been.

We passed some of the charred grasslands, blackened plains that stretched to the hills beyond. A helicopter, flying only a couple of hundred feet up,
thwocked
its way over us and we waved at the pilot and his passenger, rangers likely, probably assessing the extent of the fire damage.

“The veldtland will be better in the long run,” Dee said as the copter disappeared in the direction we’d just come. “I know that. I just can’t help thinking about how many animals might have been lost. Or how many might have survived the fire but won’t make it out regardless. I look out there now, and my heart cries for them. One minute they’re napping in the sun, the next they’re starving, burned or dead.”

She shook herself, trying to shake out the empathy.

“You can’t do it,” I told. “You can’t discard something so intimately a part of you as easily as that. The best filmmakers I know are the ones who care the most. Don’t lose sight of that.”

We’d hit the D293 road by then where one hand on the wheel was all she needed. I took the other in mine. I wanted to give her strength and support through that touch, of course, but mostly I’d gone too long without the feel of her. First touch triggered flashes from the night before and from this morning—the feel of her thighs and breasts, the touch of her hand on me
there
, the velvet softness deep inside where I could lose myself for a lifetime if I wasn’t careful.

At this point with any woman before, Chris Corsair would have dropped the hand he held bunny-quick and searched out another virgin hand, free from any memories that might smack of—no, the “L” word was still off-limits, as was the “C” one—commitment.

Christopher Darnelle, though, held on to Dee’s hand, to the warm memories it imparted, and to the future memories it promised.

By any standard, The Southern Cross Resort Hotel was small, but it did offer 5-star amenities for its clientele of professional executives who dabbled in Big Game hunting every year or two by bow or rifle or camera.

It was a gated compound outside the bustle of Mongu, with a smiling gate attendant in bright tribal dress who waved us through with a salute. A half-dozen private bungalows surrounded the U-shaped hotel whose main body was a two-story affair with one-story wings. Date palms and hibiscus appeared to the landscaper’s choice for helping guests transition from highrises to African bush. Umbrella’d tables and a glint from the sun suggested a pool, while trundling golf carts made their way to and from the private 9-hole course.

Life-size statues of a giraffe and a large antelope with a set of tall and twisting horns met us at the entrance. In the lobby’s soaring atrium, a two-story glass cage housed a menagerie of colorful birds and tiny monkeys. Tastefully taxidermied gazelles and buffalo and even a lion stood proud along the walls. Not so many as to make the camera-safari crowd overly uncomfortable, but enough to whet the appetites of the hunters here with guns. It was early afternoon, just after lunchtime, and the tiny bar open in the far corner was nearly deserted.

Gary was waiting for us, drink in hand and impeccably dressed in crisply ironed safari shorts and short safari boots as he waved us over to one of the far tables by the highly tinted picture window overlooking the courtyard. He rose to give me a not-so-quick hug that I returned with equal enthusiasm. I really had missed Gary—not just personal-assistant Gary, who made it so I never had to think about any of the details, but Gary the friend who would’ve, could’ve, maybe even should’ve been so much more.

We sat, and Dee and I ordered drinks from a waiter in boldly printed
musisi
dress who promptly appeared.

“You look like hell,” Gary offered. “And what’s that smell?”

“Barbecued veldt. And you know the camera loves my rugged bush look. It’s all about fooling the fans with authenticity. If they buy this, they’ll buy the rest of it.” I grinned, knowing precisely what effect that would have on Gary, and gave him a conspiratorial wink. He loved grand illusion even more than I did.

Falling into old patterns with Gary, though, meant forgetting for the wrong moment about Dee. Her sharp look cut me to the quick.

“Is that all this is to you? Fooling the fans? Make-believe?”

“Of course not!”

Dee’s judging eyes and Gary’s pursed lips demanded more honesty than that from me. “Not all of it.” I took Dee’s hand. “Everything we’ve been through—that’s all been real, hasn’t it? The film editors will just…embellish…it.” Setting down my drink, I took Gary’s hand as well. “Gary and I were just talking shop. Trashing work. At the end of the day, what we do is just a job.”

“What about my job, where there’s no end-of-the-day? Where what I do is what I live?” Dee tugged her hand out of mine. “And what about at night? Or is that just a job too?” She looked pointedly at Gary’s hand still meshed in mine.

Gary whistled low. “Girlfriend, don’t tell me you and he…? I guess that scruffed-up look does have its charm—for some. Personally, I love him in Armani.” He withdrew his hand as well. “But it’s been forever since he dressed up for
me
.”

I sighed. There was a pattern here with things getting more complicated with women when Gary was around. He brought out the snark in me, and I played up to my celluloid-idol image when we were together. Not to impress him; I was well beyond that in our relationship. But because a part of me enjoyed having someone around to play-act that part of my life with. He didn’t demand anything more than the surface me, the plastic me, when I was with him. Like some men reverted to their 12-year-old selves when they were around their old college buds, I fell into my inauthentic self when I was with Gary.

It was therapeutic in its way.

And harmless.

But how was Dee to know that?

“Why don’t we talk about it…tonight?” I suggested.

Gary frowned, probably at the way I was looking at Dee. “About that, I couldn’t get a block of four rooms on such short notice. I did get us three. Reena and I can stay in the one she’s in. It’s got two queen beds, appropriately enough. There’s a second room next door, but the third is in the other wing.”

“Why don’t you take the one next to Reena,” I suggested.

“But where will you…oh.” Gary’s disappointment would have been comical if it hadn’t been so sincere, and so expected. He could become tiresome fast. Just like those old college buds could.

I also didn’t like the way Dee was looking at me—like I’d destroyed some fragile trust we’d only just built between us. I turned my sexiest Chris Corsair grin on her before I realized that wasn’t what Dee needed right now. When I lost the grin, it was Christopher Darnelle inviting her to spend the night with him in a real bed, probably topped with a mint, and a champagne bucket by our side.

A flicker of anger still lit her dark eyes and she didn’t actually nod, but the way she exhaled and thinned her lips told me she accepted…with reservations. Chris would have focused on the acceptance and called it a triumph. Christopher, though, was determined to ease her reservations however he could. Putting her feelings first—and really doing it, not just paying lip service in order to get serviced by a set of full and lovely lips—was new territory for me. I could already tell it would take thought and practice. Funny how much I looked forward to that.

“Let’s get a shower, then we can all have a late lunch with Reena.”

The coconut-and-honey scented soap and shampoo sluiced through the sweat and grime and deep smell of smoke under a rain of hot water that felt like sweet benediction from above. How long had it been since I’d last showered? And how long since I’d last showered with a beautiful woman to distract me?

However long it had been for me, it was far longer—on both counts—for Dee, who swam in ponds and streams and used scented shower gels between. The ecstasy on her face—her eyes squinted shut, her bottom lip caught—as the hot water streamed over her upturned face bordered on the orgasmic. If her naked body so close to mine hadn’t triggered a flush of lust by itself, that expression would have. I went from half-hard to full-on rock solid in the time it took to pull her to me.

Reaching behind to where I beat against her thigh, she took me in the firm cylinder of her hand, her palm touching mine where I gripped the base of my cock as it strained for climax. My other hand caressed her throat, fell across her chest, circled a breast, then traveled down the quivering muscles of her stomach to cup the arch of bone at journey’s end. As water rained over us, I slipped a finger into the wet between her thighs. She groaned and squirmed, her grip on me tightening, momentary pain swiftly turning to acute pleasure. A second finger joined the first, and she held to a high shower shelf with her free hand to steady us both as she ground against the wriggle of my fingers. The tunnel of her hand sliding over me followed the rhythm of my own, faster and faster until I cried into the rain and the fountain of my ecstasy was washed clean by the cooling stream.

In front of me, Dee jerked as her inner muscles constricted and pulsed around my fingers, her breath pent as she fought her way to her own ecstasy before collapsing against me.

I covered us with coconut-and-honey suds and let the shower cleanse us one last time before the water turned too cold to stand, and we stepped out into towels warmed on heated rods.

“Oh my god,” Dee whispered. “I’ve never…”

I smiled, feeling a bit smug about it all myself.

“A towel warmer! And heated tiles!”

She was astute enough to read my deflated expression, but not sympathetic enough to refrain from laughing. “And
you
! You were a…a lion!”

My smirk only produced a fresh round of laughter.

Surprisingly, my ego wasn’t fazed at all. She was laughing at herself, at me, with me, over the whole situation. A sweet and honest sound I could have listened to all afternoon. When it bubbled to a stop, I contented myself with a last long look at her very clean and still very naked body as she traded the towel for a fresh pair of khaki shorts and a camo cotton shirt, then rubbed dry the ends of her hair, obviously deciding to let the rest dry naturally.

As I slid into my own clean shorts and shirt, it occurred to me there was something I hadn’t seen Dee do that of the women I’d known seemed more natural than breath. Where was her cosmetics bag? No compact, no lipstick tubes, no mascara brush, no hairspray.

Only the travel-size bottle of coconut-and-honey lotion left on the counter seemed to delight her as she spread an invisible layer of the cream over her face and hands. Otherwise, she left the bathroom with a face as nakedly beautiful as the one she’d entered with. Something no other woman I’d been with had ever done.

I struggled with the meaning of a woman who wasn’t trying to impress the world—or even to impress me. Who didn’t need to hide behind a painted mask. Not just because she was beautiful enough—at least in my discerning eyes—to not need to, but because she really didn’t care. Or, she did care—she had expressed shame that her body didn’t look like what she assumed the other women I’d been with did, so she was on some level aware of what I thought—but she had the courage to face the world honestly despite her insecurities.

Damn it. Without trying, she had already seduced my body and brain. Had she just cemented my respect for her as well?