Sentimental Journey (37 page)

He could not imagine what look was on her face now.

“WITH THE
WIND
AND
THE
RAIN
IN YOUR HAIR”

Someone was calling his name.

“Cassidy. Wake up!”

Kincaid.

She shook his shoulder.

“You sleep like a dead man.”

He opened his eyes. “What’s wrong?”

She was standing over him, one hand palm out. “It’s raining.”

A drop or two landed on his head.

“Feel it?”

He looked up. The sky was stone gray. Dark clouds obscured the distant mountaintops. All he could see was the bone-bare foothills. Rain sprinkled down, pattering the ground and his clothes with raindrops as big as half-dollars. By the time he stood up, the storm had broken loose. It was pouring.

“Is there any shelter nearby?” She was swiping at the rain, which flattened her hair and ran down her face.

“We need to get to higher ground,” he told her as he grabbed her arm.

He took off, pulling her with him. Ahead of them were the lower foothills, crags of rock, gravel, and crusty dirt sitting at the base of the mountains.

They needed to move fast.

It was pouring so hard now that it was raining in torrents that turned the ground to a thick, pastelike mud; it was like running through quicksand—two steps and you sank past your ankle.

He dragged her up a rocky hill so crusty half of the ground crumbled away whenever they stepped on it. Water was beginning to form muddy rivers, and it rushed at his feet and down the hillside, taking the loose silt like dirt with it.

“Wait!” she shouted and stopped. “Do you hear that?”

“I hear the rain.”

“No. Listen. Is it thunder?”

There was a distant rumble, like thunder, but it wasn’t coming from the sky; it was coming from the ground. He turned around in the direction of the fast-moving storm. It looked like the gray clouds were on the ground. He swore.

“What is it?”

“Flash flood! Run! Just run!” He almost dragged her up the hillside, climbing higher. The hillside was crumbling away from under them. He tried to find solid rock and scrambled up, pulling her with him, ridge after ridge.

He wedged his leg and hip between huge rocks just as the ground below them fell away.

She slipped with it and screamed his name.

“I’ve got you.” He pulled her up by the wrists.

She was crying and almost fell again, but he grabbed her and shoved her in front of him. “Move your feet! Climb, Kincaid. Dammit, climb!” He shoved her up and over the edge of a jagged outcropping, then pulled himself up. “Crawl forward! Away from the edge!” He looked back. “Go! Here it comes!”

He pulled her against him and wedged in between two rocks, his feet braced against them. He locked his hands together and kept her pressed against him. “We’ll make it, Kincaid! Hang on to me, brace your feet, and don’t let go!”

You could hear the roar of water coming, loud, almost like ocean waves. The ground shook and rocks crumbled past them. He looked toward the sound just as a wall of brown water slammed into them.

Water rushed over his head against the rocks. She was choking.

All he could do was hold on to her, press his boots into the rock, and try to keep them from being swept away. The floodwater tore shallow-rooted bushes from the ground. They scratched at his cheeks, his face, but he forced her head down to keep her protected.

It felt like it lasted forever, waves of water that gave them a moment to catch a breath before hitting them again and slamming him against the rocks; it was like being beaten with boulders.

The water stopped, leveled out, and subsided, washing down the hills. But the rain didn’t stop. The rocks gave them some shelter.

“You okay, Kincaid?”

She stirred, lifted her head, and pushed away from him. “Is it over?”

“I think we’re okay.”

“A-okay?”

“No. I’m not making that mistake again. We might have an earthquake next.”

She gave a short laugh, but then stopped when the wind picked up and rain blew against them.

“Get comfortable, sweetheart. We’re staying put.”

They shifted positions so she was sitting between his legs again, her back against his chest. He locked his arms around her waist.

Cold, driving rain came down for the rest of the day and into the night. They stayed on the ledge, because it was the only place he felt the ground would hold. Water rushed over and around them, stung their faces when the wind turned bitterly wild.

They had to move positions twice for some kind of protection when the rain became gusts of water or drenching showers. Puddles formed around their bodies, and soon they were sleeping in a bed of sticky dark mud. He wondered if she were right, if perhaps someone did have it in for them.

Driving clouds obscured the sky, and little gusts of rain pattered against the rocks. The steady drumming of rain lulled you to sleep, only to be woken by the howling wind.

He woke up for the tenth time, checked his watch. It was 0300. Their bodies together gave off some welcome warmth, but his left leg was asleep. He shifted positions. She murmured something into his chest. He looked down at her and brushed the hair out of her face. Her breathing was even and her eyes were closed.

Even soaking wet, with her face sunburned and mud splattered over it, she was a looker. Her dress was soaked and melted against her thighs. She had great legs and all the right curves.

But then, so did a thousand women. And he had watched women all his life. Found them fascinating creatures. Walking, talking contradictions. So many of the ones who were knockouts used their looks like a Howitzer, blowing through platoons of men who never knew what hit ’
em
until it was too late.

But Kincaid was blind. Looks were no weapon with her. If there was anything she wielded, it was her damned honesty. And funny thing, he could respect that.

He was alone with a soft woman in his arms and he was thinking about her mind, instead of her tits. He stared at her for a full minute and felt a sudden rush of vitality, a high, a buzzing, like he’d drunk half a bottle of 100-proof Smirnoff.

Shit . . . . He had it bad.

“IN THE MIDDLE OF A KISS’’

A sound woke her up. Kitty grabbed J.R.’s shoulders and shook the heck out of him. “Cassidy! Wake up! I hear a plane!”

He sat up, blinking, then shook his head. “What?”

“I hear a plane. Listen.”

“A plane?” He shoved her aside and stood up.

“Can you see it?”

“No, but the sky’s clear. Blue as all get-out. Damn, where are my binoculars? Shit, forget the binoculars.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Quick! Give me your slip.” Before she could reach for it, he jerked it out of her belt. “Stay here. Don’t move. I’m climbing up on the rocks so I can wave this at them.”

She heard the scratching of his boots on the rocks; then his body blocked out some of the sun. “Can you see the plane yet?”

“No.”

“I hear it from over there.” She pointed.

“Yeah, there it is. It’s coming from the west. It looks like they’re not flying right over us. They’re headed south and not close. Come on, you idiots! Look over here! Shit!” He paused. “Waving this at them won’t work. Come here, Kincaid. Quick!”

She stepped toward his voice. He was squatting on the top of the rock. She felt his hand on her shoulder. She held out her hand for him, and he pulled her closer against the rock, which was almost as tall as she was. She heard the click of his lighter.

“Help me blow on it, Kincaid. To get it smoking. It’s on this boulder at
twelve o’clock
about a foot away from your chin.”

She could hear him huffing and puffing on it and leaned over and joined in.

“Come on! Harder, Kincaid. Harder! It’s starting to smoke.”

“I can smell it!” She kept blowing at it, and inhaling the smoke, so she had to turn her head away to inhale.

“Don’t stop!”

She didn’t. She blew and blew until she was getting light-headed and flashes of light swam before her blurred vision.

He swore again.

She kept blowing.

“You can stop now.” She heard him exhale. He sounded disgusted. “It’s too far away. They didn’t see us.”

“Are you sure?”

“They would have circled back.”

She sagged against the boulder. “Seeing a plane must mean we’re close to something.”

“I hate to point this out to you, sweetheart, but we were in a plane and not close to anything but sand and desert and the damned flies.”

“Could you tell what kind of plane it was?”

“I’m looking at it through the binoculars right now. It’s flying into the sun. I can’t tell what the hell it is.”

She waited.

He jumped down from the rock. “It’s gone.”

“So now what?”

“We gather our stuff and climb over these mountains. I can see a pass ahead in the distance. It’s not that far. We’ll see where it leads. Maybe if we’re lucky the coast will be on the other side of these mountains.”

She couldn’t smell the sea, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t there.

“The good news is, with all that rain we have a full canteen. You thirsty?”

She took a drink. It tasted so much better than that tinny, salty, well water. “That tastes so good. I swear that well water was like drinking the
Pacific Ocean
, during the red tide.” She handed him the canteen and heard him take a drink.

“Water is water, but you’re right. After the well water, this tastes almost as good as a beer.”

“I’d love a beer. A cold, icy beer.”

“When we get out of here, Kincaid, a beer’s the first thing I’ll buy you. All the beer you want.”

“And a hot dog. With mustard, onions and sauerkraut.”

“Why do you women talk about food all the time?”

“Women don’t talk about food all the time.”

“You were just talking about hot dogs. And then there’s your reaction to that chocolate bar. It was a candy bar, not a Studebaker. Ever since I was a kid, whenever my mother and my aunts would get together in a room, all they could talk about was food.”

“I’m certain they were only sharing recipes.”

He laughed. “I doubt that. My mother has never cooked a day in her life.”