herself up on his chest and stared down in the darkness at the indistinct shadow that was his face. He was giving nothing away.
She reached up and ran her fingers lightly through his hair, caressing his broad forehead, and murmured, “I care far too much about you to let that happen without putting up a fight.” She repeated herself for emphasis. “I’m
“The shrinks say it’s normal to spend a period of time not wanting to talk about a trauma.”
She snorted. “Not when you’re destroying yourself over it.” She laid her palm against his stubbly cheek and spoke softly. “You’ve turned whatever happened inward against yourself. It’s long past time you talked about it.”
Beneath her hand he shook his head.
“Last night you forced me to talk to you, to tell you my deepest, darkest secret. And I have to admit, John, I feel better having it off my chest. I’m not big enough to physically make you talk, and I can’t threaten to abandon you out here like you did me. But John, don’t you owe me the same honesty you forced out of me?”
John stared at Melina in thinly disguised panic. The sky was falling, the trees closing in on him. He couldn’t do this! Not here. Not now. He couldn’t face his demons, not in the middle of an op. Special Forces missions were hard enough without additional dragons to slay. And no doubt about it, this had turned into a full-blown op. Problem was, he was out here solo with a civilian, and what he really needed was a twelve-or sixteen-man team and a whole lot of firepower.
Was she right? Was she all he had? Was he so far down the road to self-destruction that he had to do this now or kill them both? Hell, he didn’t know. He didn’t know anything anymore. Melina had turned everything he thought he knew about himself and his life on its head.
But to talk about the ambush…to tear back all the careful layers of insulation he’d built over that wound, to relive the agony…terror shuddered through him at the mere thought of it.
“Melina. What you’re saying may make sense. But you don’t understand what you’re asking of me.”
She gazed gently at him. “I think maybe I do understand. You’re possibly the strongest man I’ve ever known- and I’m not talking physically. If something happened that even you can’t handle, it scares me to death to imagine what that might be. We can’t fix whatever happened, and I don’t have the training to begin to help you come to terms with it. But I think we have to face it at least a little-enough to make sure you can hold it together well enough to get through whatever lies ahead of us.”
He swore under his breath. Like it or not, his gut was telling him the same thing. He pressed the heels of his hands into his eye sockets. It didn’t help the sudden and pounding headache he had.
“You don’t have to be all macho to show off for me, you know,” she murmured. She added coyly, “You already got the girl.”
He grinned lopsidedly at her. “I still have a reputation to maintain, you know.”
“Okay. Well, you do your muscle flexing and Neanderthal grunting or whatever it is you do, and I’ll try to remember to act suitably impressed. But don’t suffer needlessly, okay? Your guilt is accomplishing nothing.”
A moment of clarity burst behind his eyelids. But he
He fell asleep without finding any answers. But when he woke up, squinting into the bright morning light, he actually felt a little better. It was probably just a matter of having gotten a few hours of decent shut-eye. He had to give her credit, though. His rest was entirely her doing. He hadn’t slept for squat since the ambush…not until Melina had come into his bed and into his arms.
They went through the now familiar routine of eating breakfast and packing up camp in silence. He was eternally grateful that she didn’t feel a need to continuously and mercilessly pick at his emotional scabs.
In a contemplative frame of mind, he hefted the big backpack of gear. He waited while she picked up the small, light rucksack he’d prepared for her, and then he turned to face the trail. “Once we top this ridge, we’ll descend into a long valley and hike along its length for the rest of today and most of tomorrow.”
Melina nodded, a smile of relief on her face.
“Don’t look so happy. The forest is thicker down there and it’ll be tough going.”
Her face fell. “So we either get no oxygen or no trail?”
“That pretty much sums it up. The good news for you is I’ll go first and make a trail.”
“Three cheers for macho he-men!”
He grinned over his shoulder at her.
In point of fact, the walk down into the valley was pretty easy, and for several hours, they hiked along in companionable silence. He actually enjoyed losing himself in the simple rhythms of movement. The exercise felt good. It had been a long time since he’d done anything like this. Most of his rehab had been done in sterile, impersonal clinics or gyms. But to get outside, smell the green air, feel the wind on his skin…it was a good thing. Yet another simple gift Melina had brought back into his life.
They had about an hour of light left when they hit the tree line and entered the primeval forest of the remote Andes. Its gloom was mysterious and magical, and under other circumstances, he’d have richly enjoyed the opportunity to pass within its hallowed depths. But as it was, Melina was breathing heavily behind him and they were getting low on water. Should he press on and put a little more distance behind them, or should he go ahead and start looking for a campsite and a stream?
A small sound caught his attention. A twig snapping. Not an odd sound in the woods, but for some reason, it stood the hackles on the back of his neck straight up. He turned sharply to Melina and pressed a cautionary finger against his lips. She froze. He gestured with his hands palm down, pressing down toward the forest floor and then he sank down himself. Thankfully, Mel got the idea and sank down beside him.
She threw him a questioning gaze that needed no hand signals to translate.
He leaned close to her and breathed, “I heard something.”
Apparently, she understood that he meant he’d heard something not of these woods, something that didn’t belong out there. The two of them listened intently for many long minutes. Nada. No more noises even remotely similar to that snapping twig. And frankly, that worried him more than several more twig cracks would have. If there had been a steady pattern of snaps, he’d know some wild creature was nearby. But no beast of the forest had this much patience.
Something was out there, watching and waiting. Or rather some
Chapter 10
Melina’s gaze darted left and right, frantically seeking their follower. They were so exposed out here! She wanted to crawl over to John and creep inside his shirt, to hide her head until the danger went away and let him take care of everything. Except this whole mess was her problem, not his. He’d already gone above and beyond the call of duty to keep her safe.
After an eternity, John leaned toward her and murmured, “Whoever was out there has gone away or gone to ground.”
“Which means what, exactly?”
“We can talk and move again. Whoever’s out there isn’t going to show himself.”
“Now what do we do?”
He shrugged. “Now we press on. We still have to get to the next set of coordinates by tomorrow night.”
“Look, John, if this is too much for you, it’s okay if you just leave me a map and get out of here.”
He snorted heartily. Whether that was indignation or amusement, she couldn’t tell. But it was a definite sound of dismissal of that idea. Color her relieved, but she had to make the offer. She couldn’t, in good conscience, guilt him into staying out here with her. He was already laboring under guilt aplenty. Speaking of maps, he pulled out one of his and spread it on the ground between them.
“For the record, we’re right here.” He pointed out a spot on the map with a felt-tipped pen and made a little black dot on its laminated surface. “This is where we’re headed.” He stabbed at a red dot already marked on the map. “If something happens to me, take this map and walk out of here. Do
