The Captive's Return

Did he even notice? His instincts for children were better than he thought.



"I liked driving you crazy." Yet she found his paternal sway tugged at another corner of her heart with an equal, if different, strength.



"Oh, did you?"



"Did you really think I forgot my underwear beneath your pillow? Or that my perfume spilled inside your top desk drawer by accident?"



"I couldn't open the thing without getting turned on."



"I know." They had shared some wonderful times together. She'd lost sight of that joy buried so deeply under her guilt and grief.



His silvery-blue eyes glinted with more than a hint of arrogant surety. "Actually I was thinking more of the time at the ambassador's dinner when you—"



"Shhhh! What if Lucia wakes?" Their daughter didn't need to hear the details of gropings under a banquet table. "You didn't seem to mind one bit by dessert."



"You always were more woman than I could handle."



"I seem to recall you handled me just fine once we got back to your quarters that night," she retorted smartly—and vaguely in case her drooling daughter woke without notice.



His eyes snapped to hers, held, the humid air between them full of memories of what happened after that dinner—falling clothes and boundaries. They'd stayed awake all night and watched the sunrise together. She'd told him she loved him. He'd kissed the top of her head and breathed in deeply as if catching the scent of her hair. At the time, she'd grieved because he hadn't echoed her words.



Now she wondered why she hadn't cherished the intensity of his actions.



Again, here she was, needing his help. "Thank you for saving my brother five years ago and for saving us now."



"Did you really think I would walk away?"



"Of course not." He was too honorable.



He straightened, securing Lucia higher. "Come on, we need to get moving."



She pushed away from the tree and followed his broad shoulders again. She couldn't change the past, but she could set some parts of it straight again. Sure, her feelings still stung from his earlier comment about them being wrong for each other, but she couldn't do something childish like snap at him. She was woman enough now to know she owed him better than that.



Sara pulled up alongside him so she could see his face. "I wanted to say yes to your proposals."



He stopped blinking, a small gesture, but enough for her to know she'd surprised him, not that he said anything.



Okay, so her stinging pride burned a little hotter, but she'd made up her mind to see this through. "Don't you want to know why I turned you down?"



"You told me before." He hiked down a slight slope. "You loved your job, your country, your freedom."



"I was an immature idiot then." She grabbed a vine for balance down the small hill which felt more like a mountain, thanks to her now ten-ton backpack. "I wanted you to chase me."



"What?" His head jerked toward her.



So she'd finally shocked a real reaction from him. Wow. It had only taken five years, a mistaken death and a surprise kid.



She deserved to savor the moment. "I had to chase you so blasted hard, I wanted a sign that you felt the same frenzy."



"Good God, woman." He walked faster, boots stomping harder, trampling a patch of pink orchids. "You damn near brought me to my knees every time you I walked into a room."



Now that, she didn't believe. "You've never been on your knees in your life."



"Then you weren't looking very hard."



Further confirmation that she'd been an idiot. Her heart ached from more than exertion. She stepped ahead of him and stopped, forcing him to look at her full-on. "So you were really blown away for me."



"By you," he corrected. "Blown away by you. Yeah." His jaw flexed. "I was."



She touched his beard-stubbled face. A simple stroke over his hard, high cheekbone, but his choppy admission flowed like poetry over her heart. They may not have a future together, but for what they'd shared in the past, she appreciated hearing those starkly spoken words.



His unshaven skin rasped along her oversensitive fingertips. He might act different, more distant than before, but he felt so very familiar.



Her hand crept up to the silver flecks that marked all the years they'd spent apart. "If we shouldn't have married then, where do we go from here?"



"I'll take care of you and Lucia."



Ah, a practical, honorable answer. He hadn't changed so much at all. She wanted to laugh and maybe cry a little, too.



Instead, her arm dropped to her side. "I may not be the silly twit I was then, but I still want more from life than to be taken care of. For that matter, I've been taken care of for the past five years."



He hitched slumping Lucia higher and brushed past Sara. "I'll help you until you get your feet under you then. But when it comes to Lucia, to hell with independence. The child won't go without."



The child? Our daughter, she wanted to retort.



She shook off the prickly sensation. "Of course. What about the fact that we're married?"



"What about it?" He fished into his survival vest and pulled out a water bottle, passing it to her.



She sipped to clear her throat more than to rehydrate her weary body. "Do you want to dissolve the marriage?"



"We may have slept together, but we never consummated the vows."



"Oh. Of course." She recapped the bottle, wondering why she was pushing this now when they had days, weeks, a lifetime to sort through the mess they'd made. "You only married me because you had to."



"I think you've got that backward."



She passed the bottle to him. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry for the way I played with your heart."



"I said you brought me to my knees, but I never said I had a heart for anyone to play with." Hooking an arm back under Lucia's bottom, he used his free hand to tip the bottle and drink, his throat moving. His mouth placed right where hers had been seemed somehow intimate, even though it surely had more to do with survival than sex.



"What a clean shot at my presumptuous ego, Lucas. I was young and silly, totally caught up in the romanticism of everything. I should have been more up-front with you about—"



"Sara." He swiped his wrist over his mouth to dry a trickling drop of water.



"What?"



He tapped her shoulder with the bottle they'd shared. "We were both so hot for each other, neither of us was particularly concerned with talking."



"We certainly were." She could see her desire echoed in his eyes, the urge to kiss, connect again. "We still are."



"You're right."



"But we shouldn't do anything about it."



"Right again."



"We have so much more to talk about." Was that her voice going all breathy? "Things to settle, become reacquainted. We moved too fast before."



Dios, had she just admitted that maybe, just maybe, she wanted to try again? Exhaustion must be running deeper than she'd thought for her to make such a foolish confession.



She straightened. "Thank you for the break. I'm ready to go."



So much for being a more levelheaded woman, because any further encouragement and she would throw herself at Lucas all over again.



Something was wrong with Sara.



Lucas couldn't avoid the obvious any longer.



She'd almost drifted off to sleep walking. He'd stopped early for the night by a waterfall, and she had gone to sleep sitting up, halfway through brushing her teeth. She looked so damn cute with her toothbrush hanging out of her mouth.



He'd tugged the toothbrush out and gently lowered her onto her side. Luckily, two bananas later, Lucia curled up against her mother, content to rest quietly rather than talk to him.



Fair enough. He had plenty to do setting up camp— which gave him more time to think and worry about Sara.



A trek through the jungle was tiring, no question, but her exhaustion went beyond that. His job as a commander honed his instincts in watching others for signs of nearing the end of their reserves.



She'd been a dynamo of energy before. Not just in the bedroom, but she'd loved to dance at embassy functions until the band shut down. Or after working late into the evening, corral him into a midnight meal in downtown Cartina.



She'd mentioned a difficult pregnancy and slow recovery from her injuries. But it had been five years. An itchy sensation prickled along the back of his neck. Like a niggling thought?



Or the sense of eyes watching him.



Scanning the perimeter of their small camp, he reached for his gun strapped to his waist. Using the weapon would be a last resort since the sound would announce their location to Chavez—or worse yet, Padilla. But he didn't plan to wrestle a jaguar.



He inched to his feet, crouching. A pair of eyes glowed a few inches away. He blinked, his vision adjusting to the dark.



Lucia.



His exhale of relief only lasted a second before his brain keyed him into a more serious crisis. The kid was awake and Sara needed her sleep.



How was he supposed to keep a child occupied in the jungle? He could fly a military cargo plane in combat, command an entire squadron of aviators, trek through this jungle for months on end if need be.



But he was seriously deficient in the fairy-tale department.



Be logical. She was just a little person, right? Think about what anyone would need. "Do you need to use the bushes?"



"Nuh-uh."



"How about something to eat?" He scooped up a mango, pulled his knife from his boot and sliced off a wedge.



She scrunched her nose—ah crap—no tantrums, kiddo.



Maybe he would do better wrestling that jaguar after all.



Lucia popped the fruit into her mouth and chewed, swiping her wrist over a trickle of juice at the corner of her mouth. "I like bugs."



Huh? Maybe he could think up a bug fairy-tale. Wasn't there even some kid movie like that? He needed to invest in some serious DVD rental time when he got back. "Yeah, I like them, too."



"I like to eat'em most of all."



Well that sure surprised a smile out of him. He passed her another slice of mango. "I'll bet your mama doesn't like that much."



"Not much," she agreed, her mouth full. "You ever eat bugs?"



"Yep." He carved another slice for himself.



She stopped chewing. "Really? Did your madre get mad?"



"I was twenty-three years old. My mama didn't know."



"Wow!" she gasped. "You ate bugs when you was a grown-up? Wow! Mama says I'm too old to eat bugs, but wait'll I tell her."



Great. "You should listen to your mother."



Leaves rustled as she inched away from Sara, closer to him. "Why did you eat'em?"



"I work for the military."



"What's military?"



"Soldiers," he explained, but even in the dark he could see her brow was still furrowed, so he continued, "army men, with guns."



"Oh." She scooted toward Sara again.



Guns. Of course she was afraid of them after the past two days. Good God, the kid had nearly been blown up more than once.



He slid his gun back into the harness, grateful for the cover of night that hopefully masked the dark weapon. "There are good guys with guns and bad guys. Bad ones try to hurt people, like yesterday. Good guys with guns try to protect people. I'm one of the good guys."



Still, she didn't move nearer again. Smart kid not to believe everything somebody told her.



"So why do military peoples eat bugs like little kids do?"



"For survival training."



"Huh?" Her brow crinkled again.



He needed to remember that just because a kid was smart didn't mean she had his vocabulary yet. He had a lot more to learn than could be found in a few cartoon flicks, and far more than when he'd brought Tomas to the States. "Guys like me eat them for food when we're away from home."