Matthias

She marched over to me with that look on her face, the one that said she was a mean fighter about to step into the ring and beat the shit out of her opponent. She parked three feet in front of me, planted her feet apart, and perched her fists on those perfectly proportioned hips of hers. “You wanted to talk to me?”

“No need to cock your guns.” I lifted my hands in the air and showed her my palms. “Peace. Okay?”

“Sure.” She smirked. “That’s what you always say, right before you take your shot.”

“Hell, Jade, what part about the word ‘peace’ don’t you get?”

“You want peace?” She crossed her arms and lowered her chin, leveling her gaze on me. “Then why are you keeping me inside the station 24/7?”

So much for peace. I should’ve had a beer with dinner. Or better yet, whisky, neat.

“I’m trying to do my job.” Trying to keep her alive. “I’ll take you out as soon as practical, I promise.”

“I want to go out with the rangers on patrols.”

“Negative,” I said, automatically. “That can’t happen right now. The reserve is not secured. I have several new rangers in training and I don’t want you distracting the patrols.”

“How am I distracting to the patrols?”

My lips compressed in frustration. “Jesus, Jade, you know what happens when you’re around, don’t you?”

“What happens?” she snapped. “Disasters? Poachers? Dead-end hook ups?”

Holy hell. Time to face the music. “About the other day, at the schoolhouse—”

“I don’t want to talk about that.”

“But—”

“I said no.”

She didn’t wanna talk about the one thing I couldn’t stop thinking about. Awesome. I was gonna have to come up with some round about strategy, one that didn’t include my head detonating right here, right now.

“Don’t forget to ask him,” Sarah called out, and Jade’s cheeks flushed strawberry pink.

I nodded in Sarah’s direction. “What’s she talking about?”

“There’s a party,” Jade said icily. “Saturday. Nine O’clock. They want you to come and bring your rangers.”

I was pretty sure she wasn’t asking me out. “I don’t do parties.”

“I get that, believe me,” she said. “But maybe, I don’t know, if it doesn’t kill you, perhaps, you could make an effort and break your no-party rule, give your guys a night off, and be nice and sociable to the folks who work here. They’re fine people and they deserve their fun, even if they act a bit silly sometimes.”

I chewed on that. Maybe she was right. My rangers had been working double shifts. They deserved a little time off. “Are you going?”

“I’m not sure…maybe…” She looked away from me, a woman in bail-out mode, searching for the closest emergency exit. “Got to go now.”

I wasn’t ready for her to go, hadn’t said what I’d come to say. “Why do you have to go?”

“My ice cream is melting.”

I didn’t even have to look at the table. “You didn’t get any ice cream.”

Her head snapped up, green eyes wide. “Were you watching me?”

I saw no point in lying. “Yes.”

She steadied herself on the wall and glared some more. This wasn’t going the way I wanted. Change of subjects. “Why does Doctor Stoats hate you?”

She flicked a long-fingered hand in the air and wrinkled her nose at me. “What?”

“Doctor Stoats,” I repeated. “The way he looks at you. He doesn’t like you. Why?”

My question took her by surprise. Obviously, she didn’t think Stoats’ glares were evident to anyone other than herself. Well, she was wrong. Stoats didn’t like Jade and his hateful stares had moved him to the top of my watch list.

“Oh, that. It’s nothing.” She dismissed my concern with a wave. “On her first day here, Stoats demanded a blow job from Lara. I got pissed, so I told him off.”

How I kept my jaw from breaking from my clench was beyond me. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Nope,” she said. “Not a joke.”

I opened and closed my mouth several times before I could muster the restraint to speak instead of shouting at the top of my lungs. “Why didn’t you come to me right away?”

She shrugged. “What for?”

“What do you mean, what for?” I clasped my fists so tightly that my knuckles ached. “How about so that I could do my job and take care of the situation?”

“There was no need,” she said. “I took care of the situation.”

“Jade…” I looked up to the heavens, begging for some serious divine assistance or for a bolt of lightning to put me out of my misery. She didn’t trust me. There was an excellent chance she was never gonna trust me. My face and ears were on fire, announcing the outrage that seemed to be my permanent status around Jade.

“Here’s the deal,” I said, trying to stick to a civilized tone although my voice came out clipped and stark. “When you have a problem at this station, be it a leaky roof or an instance of sexual harassment, you come to me.”

“Why would I do that when I’m perfectly able to take care of myself and my friends?”

I inhaled all the air in the Serengeti into my lungs. She really did believe she was alone in the world and I was a piece of shit good for nothing.

“I’m the game warden here.” I grappled to hold together the shattered pieces of what had once been my control. “It’s my job to keep everything and everybody safe. Sexual harassment will not be tolerated here. If Lara, or any other person for that matter, doesn’t feel safe at this station, if anyone, including you—especially you—has a problem, I need to know.”

“Okay, all right, take a chill pill,” she said. “Now you know. End of story.”

“That’s what you think,” I muttered.

She shifted on her long legs, examining her hands. “Are we done now?”

“No.” I narrowed my eyes on her face. “I don’t think he’s such a good idea for you.”

Jade shook her head, trying to dispel the confusion clouding her eyes. “Who?”

“Drake,” I said. “You’ve been given fair warning.”

“Oh, wow.” She gawked at me as if I’d just slapped her on the face. “I don’t know what to say. Thank you, I guess, but also stay the hell out of my private business.”

This was going from bad to worse. “I didn’t mean to—”

“I’ve had it with your shitty attitude.” Her eyes sparkled with anger. “Maybe you don’t like Peter. Maybe you think you own all the grazing rights around here. Perhaps you feel as if it’s your prerogative to make out with whoever you like, whenever you like, and then move on. Or maybe you can’t stand a little competition in your play yard. It messes with your captive harem.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Stop playing games with me,” she snapped. “I see through your power plays. I’m not someone you can charm with a little advice. I’m not a fool you can mislead and manipulate with a couple of make out sessions. And I’m most definitively not like the rest of the world out there.”

“I know that!”

“I’m not going to be dazzled by your good looks.”

I got a little stuck on that one. She thought I was good looking?

“And I’m not going to sigh like a smitten maiden every time you walk by.”

Talk about an expectation I’d never have from Jade Defiance Romo.

“And so that you know,” she added as an afterthought. “I’m not going to fall for this ruse, this game you like to play, where you pretend to ‘manage’ people when you really just want to be admired, ogled over and worshipped wherever you go in this freaking reserve.”

I tried to put in a word. “Jade…”

“Don’t you Jade me!” Her temper was off the leash. “I’m not waiting around pinning for you like all the women around here and half the men. Let me make it real clear for you.” She stabbed her finger against her chest. “I’m waiting around for the opportunity to take pictures and tell my stories. I’m waiting, not because I want to make out with you, but because I’m a professional and I promised the director I would play by your rules and, unlike some other people around here, I keep my word!”

I managed to ground out a reply. “Are you questioning my word?”

“I’ve sat on my ass for days, waiting at your pleasure.”

“There are reasons behind my choices!”

“And they are?”

“Matthias? Jade?” A voice interjected before I could answer.

I whirled around to find Sarah standing a few feet away, forehead furrowed with concern.

“You guys okay?” she said.

“We’re fine.” Silly girl. Did she really think I could ever hurt Jade?

“In that case,” Sarah said, eyes shifting from me to Jade, “the two of you may want to keep it down. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but you guys are like the Tuesday night movie. Everybody is watching.”

I looked around. The entire dining room was staring at us.

“Thanks, Sarah,” I said with as much equanimity as I could muster.

“I was leaving anyway.” Jade whirled on her heel.

I took her elbow. “Let me walk you to your room.”

“No, thank you.” She snatched her arm from my hold and met my eyes. “I’m perfectly capable of finding my room on my own.”

And with that, she marched out of the main lodge, leaving me behind as if I was dead and buried on the battlefield.

* * *

Jade

I marched across the pool deck, through the dining room and out of the lodge with my back straight as a rod. It was a miracle I didn’t break into a sprint. There were few things I hated more than all those eyes on me. I didn’t like to be the center of attention. It brought back my childhood’s bad memories.

As soon as I left the main lodge, I turned on my flashlight and accelerated into the night. The walkway’s wooden boards clattered under my steps. I took in a cleansing breath and choked on the suffocating stink of hippo dung. Yuck. One or more of the local big boys had been by recently. I leaned over the railings and looked down. There had been rain and the river had jumped its banks and flooded the marsh beneath the elevated pathways.

In the branches above my head, a bush baby cried a mournful wail. Considering how angry and confused I felt at the moment, the sound could’ve come straight from my throat. In front of me, a snake slithered silently across the walkway. I stopped and took a few steps back. I breathed deeply and waited politely for it to go across and disappear into the bush. No need to get bitten by one of the local mambas tonight.

A snake. That’s what Matthias was. He struck with a kiss, injected your veins with his poison, and then left you to die a slow, painful death. The analogy was a bit dramatic, even for me, but hey, it worked.

But not me. No way. I wasn’t falling for him.

The light of my flashlight illuminated the figure standing on my stoop. Matthias waited at my door, leaning against the wall. He lifted a hand to shield his eyes from my beam. I grounded the white light circle on the boards and forced myself to breathe. My heart fluttered, and so did my brain. Great. Now, in addition to a fluttering heart, I had a fluttering brain.

Shields up. “How did you get here before me?”

“I took a shortcut,” he said, eyes fixed on me like laser beams.

“I thought you said we had to stick to the walkways.”

“You do.”

But not him, not the great Matthias. He got to do whatever he wanted. I groaned inside, turned off my flashlight, and fished my key out of my pocket. I walked past him and attempted to jam the key into the lock, but the moonlight played with the shadows and I ended up missing the opening completely. Shit. Even my hands were fluttering.

“What are you doing here?” I said, fumbling with the key.

“You left,” he said, “but I wasn’t finished.”

“Well, I was.”

“Here, give me that.” He took the key from me and inserted it cleanly into the lock, as if he were a nocturnal creature and could see perfectly at night. With a jiggle and a twist, he unlocked the deadbolt and handed me the key. “There you go.”

“Thanks.” I pocketed the key. “Good-bye.”

“Hang on.” His hand landed on my arm, big, warm, and all encompassing, a touch that sent thrill jolting to every corner in my body. He pressed his lips together, before he spoke again. “I think you should know that I tried.”

A frown tensed my forehead. “You tried what?”

“I tried to forget about you,” he said. “I missed meals. I avoided any part of the station where you were hanging out. Hell, I even changed my routine. But I failed. Okay? When I set my mind to something, I don’t fail very often. But this time around, I did. Is that what you wanted to hear?”

Was he trying to say what I thought he was trying to say?

“The problem is,” he went on, unstoppable. “I don’t want to stay away from you anymore. Sure, it’s the worst possible moment. And you are a pain in the ass. But there’s no way around this. We’re going to have to work this shit out, preferably before I go insane.”

Insane?

He more or less growled. “Tell me you didn’t feel it.”

Christ almighty.

“Tell me you didn’t drop off at the end of the world and forget that anything but you and I existed.”

The alarms were going berserk in my head.

He stepped closer to me, his body pinging my cells like a submarine on the hunt, my cells replying to his signal with a chain of primal vibrations that must have spelled d-e-s-i-r-e in Morse code.

“Tell me, Jade,” he said, his voice softening, his eyes glowing. “Tell me that you don’t want to try that all over again, on the off chance that it was all a really cruel mistake and we’re both off the hook. Tell me that you want us to end before we begin. Tell me you don’t want me to kiss you right now and I’ll go away for good.”

I opened my mouth and then…closed it. I knew what I should say. Leave me the hell alone. I just couldn’t get myself to say it. I didn’t have the strength to send him away. I didn’t have the will to suppress the rogue passion pounding in my chest.

The emotions bombarding my brain fractured my self-control and cratered my logic. My instincts took over. The smoldering ember inside of me ignited. I plummeted from the great heights I’d constructed for myself. Nothing else to do. I threw my arms around Matthias’s neck, pressed my body against his, and kissed him with all I had.

Matthias rumbled, a deep, sexy sound that unraveled me from the inside out. He absorbed my body’s impact, crushing me to his chest. He kissed me with the same desperation I felt, reversing the flow, trapping me between the door and his body, taking charge of the kiss, draining me of breath, will and thought, pouring gasoline on my fire.

“Damn,” he rasped when we came up for air.

“This is not happening,” I muttered to myself.

He kissed me again, melting my bones with his heat, running his hand over my body as if learning all my curves. “This is happening and there’s nothing you or I can do about it.”

His kiss was a paralyzing force, a brain-killing venom of the extremely pleasant variety, a hypnotic contact. I drifted far and away and didn’t come back to earth until the tide of his passion started to relent. Slowly, deliberately, the pressure of his mouth eased over my lips. With a sigh, he brushed his mouth against mine then leaned his forehead on mine, chest heaving with breaths that matched my own desperate gasps.

“I get that you may not be ready,” he murmured. “I wasn’t exactly ready myself. It took me by surprise.”

It? What was it? And how on earth could he define whatever the hell was happening to me with a word as simple and generic as it?

“I don’t have a plan,” he said. “For once, I don’t have a clue on how to do this. So take your time. I can wait…at least a little, I mean, a day, maybe two.”

“But…” I struggled to find my words. “You said it was a clusterfuck, a mistake.”

“It’s complicated, that’s what I meant.” He paused, kissed my forehead, then pulled back a little to meet my gaze. “But I’m not gonna tiptoe around this anymore. I’m not gonna fight it and I’m not gonna pussyfoot around you either. Be ready. Tomorrow. Five thirty. I’m taking you out.”

I was speechless. Me, Jade Romo. Speechless. I’d forgotten how to speak, how to think. Hell, I’d forgotten how to breathe.

As if making a great effort, Matthias pried his fingers loose and let go of me. He grabbed the handle and opened the door. “In you go.”

I took a step backward into the bungalow, knees shaking, legs wobbly. I was afraid that he was going to follow me in, but I was also terrified that he wasn’t going to follow me in.

His fingers tightened around the door handle. I knew what he wanted, needed. The magnetic anomaly was on. He pulled on me as hard as I pulled on him. If I said the word, he’d come in and then…

No. This man would be no trivial lay. Him, I might not be able to handle. So I clamped down on my lips, trying against all odds to stick to my original plan.

“I’m not very good at this talking shit,” he said. “I’m not very patient either. So I’m asking: don’t wait too long. I’m making a huge effort over here.”

What could I say to that? I nodded, because if his effort was half of mine, it was still too much to bear.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said. “Do me a favor. Don’t forget to lock the door.”

He closed the door with a quiet click. I didn’t hear his steps walking away. I stared at the door for a very long time. Part of me wanted to bolt it shut, to board it up with steel plates and nails. The other part of me kept hoping that the door would open again to admit Matthias.

I don’t remember how I got through my evening routine, but I never did get around to locking the door. Somehow, I made it to bed. The mattress was lumpier than usual. It took me a long time to find sleep. When it finally came, Matthias arrived with my dreams. I might have slept some, but I got absolutely no rest.