Page 17 of Love in the Wild

“Wait ... What?”

“Too wet,” he said in a low voice. “Animal skins need to dry.”

“Skins? Oh, my clothes.” She glanced around, not quite able to see him clearly. Maybe it would be okay to take off her clothes in the dark? Eden hesitated a second and then peeled off her clothes, even her panties.

“Sit,” he urged, and she did, tucking her knees up to cover her body.

“Hey, do you have a name?” she asked the tall, warm man sharing the darkness with her.

“Thorne.”

“Thorne? Just Thorne? No last name?” Eden tried to see his face as he knelt down beside her on the bed of furs. Her heart jumped in nervousness at what he might do next.

“Son of Keza,” he added quietly.

“Is Keza your father?”

“Mother.” The word was spoken with a fierce tenderness.

“Is she here? Does she live with you?”

There was a long silence. “No. Thorne left. Thorne see them sometimes.”

Eden nearly jumped when she felt a hand touch hers. Thorne stroked a fingertip over her knuckles, the gentle touch exploring and soothing rather than threatening.

“Sleep,” he said in the mantle of darkness. “Thorne protect.”

Eden knew she shouldn’t lie down in her undressed state, nor should she bury her face in the furs and start to rest. But the makeshift bed was soft against her bare body. It was only late afternoon, but she was indeed tired. She was a little cold, but Thorne soon wrapped the furs around her, and she could smell an inviting masculine scent clinging to them.Hisscent. Clean man and waterfall with a hint of mango. It was a scent she would dream of for the rest of her life, just as she knew she would dream of this wild forest god.

* * *

Eden woke hours later.She sensed that she was alone and crawled toward the distant sound of the waterfall until she saw light up ahead. It would have been reasonable to panic, yet the words “Thorne protect” had left her feeling safe. How that was possible, she didn’t know.

As she reached the edge of the waterfall, she found her clothes just out of reach of the water’s misting spray. She found they were dry and looked clean of the mud, though there were some rust-colored stains. Blood that would never wash out, but at least she would feel clean.

Eden dressed and carefully walked along the ledge to exit the waterfall. She froze at the sight of Thorne standing waist-deep in the lake. His sun-bronzed skin was taut over his bulging muscles, yet he wasn’t built like a bodybuilder. His muscles came from necessity, not vanity, and there wasn’t an ounce of fat on him. He was perfect. A littletooperfect, except for the faint scars that could be seen all over his body. She could not tell their origins, only that they must have been painful. Life in the jungle had to be insanely dangerous.

It was impossible for Eden not to feel the raw animal magnetism that he radiated. She’d never felt so drawn to anyone before in her entire life. Water cascaded down his forearm, and he splashed lightly as he cleaned himself.

Eden, pull it together. You’re having a crisis. You cannot get fixated on this guy. You survived a horrible ordeal, and now you’re in some jungle-man fantasy that cannot be real.

Maybe she hadn’t survived? Maybe this was all an elaborate dream in her own private heaven. That didn’t seem like such a bad thing. In fact, spending the rest of eternity in an emerald jungle and bathing beneath waterfalls with a forest god sounded amazing.

Eden had always dated guys who wore suits and focused on business. She was drawn to their take-charge attitudes and how they could dominate her in bed in the best possible ways. They were all attractive, nice and fit, but none of those relationships had lasted long. The connection she longed for, like the one her parents had, never existed with those men.

But there was something here between her and this quiet man of the wild. He was like an ancient god who could hold the heart of a star in his palms. His face was focused, predatory, yet compassion softened his features whenever he gazed at her.

Eden moved off the ledge and leapt down onto the muddy bank of the lake, her gaze still locked on Thorne. He stopped washing and stared at her, his palms resting on the surface of the water by his hips, drawing her focus to that V-shaped muscle that always made her a bit dizzy when she saw it on a man. And Thorne’s was the best she’d ever seen.

“Thorne, can you take me to the forest guides?” she asked as she put on her hiking boots, which still sat by the lake. It had been the last thing on her mind, but rationality had returned. She needed to get back to civilization, find the police, and tell them what had happened to the tour group. Then she had to call her family and let them know she was safe. After that, she needed therapy. Lots of it.

“Forest. Guides?” He repeated her request but did not seem to understand.

“Yes. The place where we went to see the gorillas.”

“Gorillas?” This word he spoke more confidently.

“Yes.”

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