Page 8 of Hot Soldier's Rescue

She stopped. “You can go back to town. But I’m staying here.”

“No. You’re not.”

The words were uttered quietly, but with unmistakable authority. Obviously, this was a man used to having his orders followed. Tough. She didn’t work for him, and she had a job of her own to do out here. She had yet to make contact with the insurgent whose family was hiding the Garza children. And until she found those kids, she wasn’t going anywhere.

She commenced walking again. “I’m not going to argue with you—”

“Good. We leave at first light.”

“You leave at first light. I’m not done here.”

He made a sound of disgust. “You have no idea how done you are here.”

She paused in the doorway of his shack. “I’m not kidding—”

He interrupted her yet again. “Neither am I. There’s no way I’m letting you stay in this camp without me here to run interference. You’d have been dead, or worse, several times already if I hadn’t intervened on your behalf.” His voice dropped to a bare thread of sound. “These men are brutal. Violent. No respect for your vocation. I won’t let you stay.”

“It’s not your call,” she muttered back.

He must have sensed her stubbornness because he huffed and finally retorted, “I’m bigger than you. I’ll throw you over my shoulder and haul you out of here by main force if I have to.”

“You wouldn’t.”

His golden eyes glittered in the faint flicker of the fire. “Try me.”

There were any number of things she’d like to try with him, but being hauled out of here over his shoulder was not one of them. Clearly, there was no reasoning with the man. And standing here arguing with him wasn’t doing any good. She’d explain things to him in the morning when they’d all had some rest.

But how she was going to convince him she had to stay with this bunch of murderous cutthroats without mentioning the Garza children, she had no idea. She’d cross that bridge tomorrow. Right now her eyes were burning, her shoulders ached and she was cold. She just wanted to crawl into the bed that smelled deliciously like this man’s aftershave and crash.

* * *

A light touch,stroking through her hair, woke Elise gradually. The night sounds of the jungle had given way to a chorus of chirping and squawking, birds mostly. It must be morning. Although she couldn’t tell with her face completely buried under the blankets. She inhaled the intoxicating scent of the man who normally slept in this bed and sleepily imagined him draped over her like a warm blanket.

The fingers stroked her hair again, slowly. With sensual appreciation. She started to turn into the caress before she woke enough to remember. Nun. Cursing under her breath, she threw the covers off her head and rolled over to protest the intimate wake-up call.

Drago towered over her, a perplexed frown on his handsome features.

“Did my patient make it through the night?” she asked.

“Yes. But he’s feverish. Sweating. Swelling and abdominal pain.”

“Peritonitis,” she announced. “I was afraid of that.”

Drago shrugged. “It was inevitable.”

“He’s going to need massive infusions of antibiotics,” she replied. She left unsaid the part where, even then, the man’s survival was going to be a dicey thing.

“The sooner the better,” the arms dealer replied. “Regardless of your objections last night, I’m going to need you to ride to town with me to watch your patient. He’s getting delirious and we can’t have him tossing around and tearing his stitches. Then he’d die for sure.”

She scowled and sat up, clutching the blankets to her chest. She wore only a camisole under the covers and, nun or no nun, wasn’t about to flash him a bunch of skin way out here in the jungle by herself. Darn him, he’d struck upon the one argument she couldn’t refute. If the injured man needed her nursing skills, she couldn’t very well deny him her aid.

“You’re taking advantage of my duty as a nurse,” she grumbled.

He held out her dress and turned away so she could throw back the covers and shiver into it. “Of course I am. I play to win, Sister.”

She glared at his back. Jerk. She yanked on her sweater, thankful for its meager warmth and uncaring of its bread-mold color this morning. By the time she got back from the latrine pit, Drago was supervising the loading of the unconscious man into the back of his Jeep.

Elise eyed the moped, which had been brought into the camp overnight, with regret. “I really need to return that to its owner.”

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