Jake blinked at her modest tone, and it dawned on him what she was trying to do. “Oh, yeah, sure. Sorry.”
Turning around, he tried to think of something else. Anything other than the fact that, at this very moment, Olivia Bradshaw was getting completely naked...less than five feet away from him.
The crotch of his pants began to feel snug. Within seconds, the damn zipper was downright painful, and his rigid cock began throbbing to the rhythm of his heartbeat.
Fearing she’d notice, Jake pulled his hands from his pockets and casually covered himself. Just when he thought he couldn't take much more, he heard Olivia's sweet voice from behind.
“Okay. I’m done.”
When Jake turned to face her, his breath stilled. Her hair was a mess, her face was bruised, and she wore elastic bandages for shoes, but damn, if she wasn’t the most beautiful thing he’d ever laid eyes on.
He stared. Couldn’t help it. The second he’d turned around, his mouth had gone desert dry. He couldn’t think of a single fucking thing to say.
****
One glance at the expression on Jake’s face and Olivia knew she must look even worse than she’d thought. She ran a hand through her hair, trying to tame the tangled waves as best she could. Too bad he hadn’t felt the need to pack a hairbrush in his bag of goodies.
Unsure of what to do next, she handed him back the toiletries. “Here. Thank you.”
Jake took the items from her and put them back into his bag, but still didn’t say anything.
“Um, what should I do with this?” She’d rolled the dress around the dirty wipes and held it in a ball in her hands. “I’m assuming we don’t want to leave any evidence that we’ve been here.”
His voice sounded a bit rough when he said, “I’ll take them.”
Jake grabbed a gallon-size plastic bag from his backpack and put the soiled things inside. After pressing the extra air out and sealing the bag closed, he rolled it up and shoved it into a side-pocket before turning back to her.
There was another moment of awkward silence before he asked, “Feel better?”
She glanced down at his clothes on her body and tried not to think about the fact that they smelled like him. “I do. Thanks.”
Jake shrugged it off and sat back down in the same place he’d been before. Leaning against the tree he said, “I know it’s not much, but I figured it would be better than that dress. We’ll find you some other clothes when we get to the hotel.”
“Hotel?” Olivia settled beside him, doing her best to ignore the twinge of pain in her ribs.
“If my compass and intel are correct, and given that both came from D, I’m sure they are, we’ll be in town by mid-morning, or a little after. It’ll be a little later than planned, but that’s okay. We’ll get cleaned up, eat a real meal, and a good night’s sleep before heading home the next morning.”
“D?” she smiled curiously.
Jake gave her a lopsided grin. “Derek West. He’s a genius. Literally.”
She’d come back to that later. “And this hotel...please tell me it at least has a shower.”
Even though she’d had one this morning and had just used Jake’s wipes to clean herself off, Olivia still couldn’t wait to stand under some hot, soothing water in a place she could relax. Somewhere safe.
Jake grinned. “It does. Granted, it’s not a five-star resort, but it’s a room.”
Olivia sighed and rested her head against the tree. “Plan B sounds fantastic right about now.”
He laughed quietly. “Well, like I said, it’s nothing fancy, but I can guarantee it’ll be a damn sight better than this. I would have picked someplace nicer, but—” He cut himself off abruptly.
“But, what?”
Jake’s expression softened. “When we made contingency plans, we weren’t expecting to have you along for the ride.”
A sad smile formed on her lips. “No, I guess you wouldn’t have.” After a beat of silence, she shook her head in wonder.
Curiosity flared behind his eyes and that tilted smile returned. “What?”
Sounding almost wistful, she told him, “I must have gone over my plan to escape a hundred times. I tried to think of every possible situation that could mess things up for me, and how I could still make it out of there if any of those things happened. But in all the scenarios that played through my mind, not one included having you here with me.”
****
Jake was glad he wasn’t the only one still amazed at the day’s turn of events. His smile grew again, and damn, if it didn't feel good.
“I guess we both got a pretty good shock today, huh?”
Olivia snorted, the sound more adorable than it probably should’ve been. “You can say that again.”
She leaned her head back against the tree and closed her eyes. Jake thought she’d fallen asleep, but after a few minutes of silence, her voice cut through the jungle’s night air.
“I would have tried to escape sooner, you know.”
He shifted, leaning on his left shoulder in order to see her face better. With no accusation in his tone, Jake asked, “Why didn’t you?”
Olivia turned, facing him more directly, too. “During those first few days, I'd convinced myself that someone was out there, looking for me. I didn’t know those men had”—she looked away, fighting against tears Jake knew were there, but couldn’t see—“I didn’t know everything they had done to the others. Not until one of them brought me an American newspaper. He thought it was funny.”
She nearly spat that last word out, and though, he glad to see some of Liv’s fire again, Jake wanted to find whichever asshole she was referring to and beat his goddamn face in.
“The day I saw that article, I knew I was on my own.”
His chest hurt. The whole damn thing ached. Unable to keep from it, he reached over and grabbed hold of her hand.
Giving it a gentle squeeze, he said, “It’s okay, Liv. You don’t have to tell
