shock, and now I can barely keep up with you. How far is it? Do you need any help?'
'No, I told you I healed well.' He raised his face to the sky. 'Particularly in the sun. It sinks in and makes me strong.'
'Vitamin D doesn't heal wounds.'
'Then maybe it's my imagination.' He smiled. 'Or maybe I'm remembering all the times Paco told me that nature was the only real healer.'
'No magic potions for that?'
'A couple, but he preferred to try sun and water first.' He stopped and pointed up the bluff. 'The cave's up there. Let me go up first and make sure that it's not been taken over by scorpions and rattlesnakes.'
'Be my guest.'
She watched him as he climbed the slope. Every step was imbued with sensuality, strength, and grace, and his dark hair shone in the strong sunlight. He was truly a magnificent specimen, and it was no wonder he'd had no problem getting those town girls to come up here. When he had spoken before about his wild youth, she had not been able to imagine it. But now she had experienced the boldness and impatience beneath that quiet control. She had caught a glimpse of that reckless boy.
Boy? No, she would bet that even during his youth he was totally male, totally adult. If he was wild, it would be with the full knowledge of his actions and ac cep tance of the consequences.
'Come ahead.' Marrok was waving to her. 'Not a rattler in sight.' He disappeared into the cave.
But were there ghosts? she wondered as she started up the incline. Perhaps the ghost of Paco and the life that Marrok had lived before.
If there were spirits, there was nothing threatening about them, she thought as she entered the cave. It was a small area, no more than ten by twelve. There was a mattress covered by a dusty blanket in the corner. A red plastic ice chest was shoved against the wall, and three camping lanterns were scattered about the cave. 'I expected to see-I don't know. Didn't you say your shaman friend once lived up here?'
'And you don't see any signs of him.' He opened the chest and pulled out a sealed bottle of water and handed it to her. 'This is all stuff I brought up after he died. But there wasn't much more than this when he was alive. He believed in living simply. He had a chest for his clothes and one for his potions. I gave him a hand-operated generator to charge the cell phone I bought him, and he tucked it in the corner over there. Most of the time he'd let it go dead, and I still couldn't get in touch with him. Every now and then he'd charge it up to call me and tell me that I was wasting my time, and I needed to come back so that he could continue teaching me. I never paid any attention to him, but it was good to hear his voice.' His gaze wandered around the cave. 'When he died, I burned everything belonging to him. Including his body.'
'What?'
'It was Paco's wish.' He opened a bottle for himself. 'I did it all by myself. He didn't want anyone else attending. I scattered his ashes to the four winds.'
'Wasn't that illegal?'
'Ask me if I care. I certainly didn't at the time.' He was searching through a compartment in the ice chest and brought out a small vial. 'And I probably wouldn't now.' He uncapped the vial. 'Come here. I need your help.'
'Why?' She crossed the cave to stand in front of him. 'And what is that stuff?'
'A medicine created by Paco and refined by me.' He handed her the vial. 'Take a few drops and rub it into the wound. It helps accelerate the production of blood cells.'
She frowned. 'I will not. I'm not about to administer a medicine that hasn't been approved by the FDA.'
'Then I'll have to do it myself. It will just be awkward.'
'Don't do it. I gave you penicillin on the helicopter. That should be fine.'
'But slow. Too slow. I have to get over this fast.' He took a few drops on his forefinger and rubbed it into the wound. He flinched. 'I'd rather you'd done it. It stings, and having you touch me would have been a distraction. Oh, yes, definitely a distraction.' He unbuttoned his shirt and took it off. 'Come with me. If you refused me medication, you can at least give me company.'
She stiffened. 'I don't know what-'
'And you're jumping to conclusions.' He added softly, 'Seductive, interesting, erotic conclusions, but I know it's not the time. It may never be the time.' He was heading for the cave entrance. 'Certainly not on that dirty pallet. I just want sun on this wound. It seems to help the medicine to sink in. Or so Paco always told me.'
'In spite of what you told me about not listening to him, you seem to be willing to follow his advice.' She followed him out into the sunlight. 'I can understand wanting to follow a dying man's wishes about the disposal of his remains. But you could have gotten into trouble.'
He shrugged. 'I was in trouble all the time anyway.' He dropped down on a flat, smooth rock outside the cave entrance. 'Sit down. The heat radiates and comes up out of this rock and eases every muscle in your body.'
'Not scientific.' But he was right, the heat was wonderfully soothing. 'But good.'
'Paco used to sit here in the afternoons.' He took a drink of water and closed his eyes. He looked lazy and totally sensual, half-naked, with the sun stroking the bronze smoothness of his bare skin. 'Sometimes I'd sit with him. He wouldn't let me talk. He said those were the moments to repair the soul. Usually I was too restless to worry about my soul and took off after a few minutes. Later, I wished I'd spent more time with him.'
'We always want to get those moments back after we lose someone.' She lifted the bottle to her lips. 'Marrok doesn't sound Apache. Did you take your mother's name?'
'Why would I do that?' He opened his lids and took another drink. 'She cared nothing about me.'
'You don't know that. Sometimes circumstances get in the way.'
'And sometimes a baby gets in the way if a woman wants to be free. My father used to talk about her sometimes when he was stoned. Pale ivory skin, fine Castilian features and eyes dark as night. He wanted her back. Not me. I didn't need her. I didn't want her either.'
'Your name?' she prompted.
'Now what would be a good name for a half-breed? Joseph Running Deer?'
'It's a beautiful name.'
'But not mine.' He took another drink. 'Though I was once called Joseph. I changed it when I came to live with Paco.'
'A new start to a new life?'
'Maybe. Something like that. Paco didn't care what I called myself.'
'How did Paco die?'
He looked out at the horizon. 'Danner killed him.'
Her gaze flew to his face.
'Not personally. He hires people for that kind of job. He had him beaten to death.'
Shock jagged through her. 'Good God.'
'I didn't think there was much good about God that night. I found Paco down on the plateau, where they'd dumped him like a heap of garbage.'
'How did you know it was Danner?'
'Paco wrote about it in his book of spells. He was expecting it to happen. He'd made preparations.'
'Against Danner? Dammit, I want to know about this Danner. Details, not vague bullshit.'
'From the beginning?' He took another drink of water. 'Danner grew up poor and never got enough power or money. He was the son of a missionary who dragged him all over the world into jungles and third-world villages to preach the gospel. He hated the life, but he was exposed to all varieties of primitive herbal medicines and cures. From voodoo priests to jungle witch doctors. Some of the cures and potions seemed to work, and he thought he'd found a way to get away from a life he hated and onto the gravy train. He became a chemist and went back into the wilds and began to 'appropriate' the secrets of those primitive tribes. Two years later he sold an arthritis painkiller to a pharmaceutical company for a staggering amount of money. After that he was on his way. In the next twenty years several homeopathic cures and little-known herbal breakthroughs paved his way to billions.'
'If he's so rich, why would he be doing this?'
'I told you, for Danner there's never enough.' He paused. 'And all his life he's been searching for the big bonanza. The drug that would make him king of all he surveyed.'
'And what is that?'
'The panacea.'
