Page 9 of Rescue Me (Tempting SEALs 6.10)

The sounds of the jungle once again intruded.

“Okay?” At her nod, he said softly, “Let’s put some distance between them and us. I need both my hands free. Grab onto my belt and hang on.” He guided her fingers to the small of his back, and she latched into his wide utility belt, his body heat making her own temperature spike.

“We’re going to haul ass on three. All you have to do is hang on and keep up with me. Save your questions and trust me, okay?”

Trust him?

Who was he?

THREE

THE JUNGLE NEVER SLEPT.

Nocturnal animals, reptiles, and birds growled, slithered or chirped as they were disturbed in the darkness. Thanks to the glowing visibility of his NVGs, Sam avoided stepping on a puff adder slithering across his path. Hissing, it inflated its body in warning. Sam stamped his booted feet to hurry it on its way. The adder was highly poisonous, and while it moved sluggishly, it could turn around and strike with lightning speed.

“Why are we stopping?” Beth whispered against his left shoulder blade.

“Cross traffic.” He waited until the tail of the adder disappeared. He smelled lemon-scented Beth, and sex. Wishful thinking. After kissing her it had taken a while for the cockstand to go down. He was always in an uncomfortable state of semi-arousal when she was close. Touching her, kissing her, had almost put him over the edge “All clear.” He resuming walking.

The dense canopy of deciduous trees overhead made the swampy ground of the understory relatively easy to navigate. Still, the few small trees, man-high ferns, bushes, and snaking vines and roots made progress slow and treacherous.

So far he’d barely used the machete. Ignoring the tug at his waist, he balanced the HK MP5 fully automatic submachine gun with a laser sight in his right hand. He’d picked up the smaller pack and was loaded for anything that threatened them, from an aardvark to a zebra, two-legged mammals to everything else. Sam had absolutely no illusions about needing every bit of firepower he carried.

It was fortunate for him that currently there was a skirmish on the border between Huren and Mallaruza. The typical bands of rebels and soldiers from both sides, and soldiers for hire, were absent this far away. Usually they roamed the country, destroying everything and everyone in their path like human locusts. Looking for trouble and always finding it. And if not, making it.

Unless Thadiwe called in reinforcements, the odds were currently in Sam’s favor.

Thadiwe expected his surgeon to report to his operating room at 0700. At 0701 he’d have his men fanning out to find her.

“We should go and get the Jeep you hid. We’d make better time,” Beth whispered half an hour later, fingers still tucked in his waistband. Her steps didn’t falter in the sultry darkness, although her quiet voice did.

“I have a boat waiting.” Sam got a quick whiff of the lemon-scented soap she favored. Unlikely beneath the DEET, but imaginary or not, the lemon fragrance brought to mind every aching memory he had of Dr. Elizabeth Goodall. He’d seen her serious and professional in her crisp white lab coat at her small clinic back home. Pale red hair twirled up on top of her head in some smooth intricate roll that looked as though one tug would bring the entire mass tumbling down her back.

He’d salivated seeing her—long-legged and sexy, in jeans and a sky-blue T-shirt, that shiny red-gold hair flowing over her shoulders as she’d walked beside him to go to a movie. Then in that yellow sundress that cupped her small breasts and bared her pretty shoulders when he’d seen her with a girlfriend at that little Italian place she liked.

Jesus. She was so fucking out of her element it was surreal. Y

et somehow she still managed to maintain that air of unflappability that her patients were used to seeing.

She was so delicate, so earnest. He’d spent a year and a half pussy-footing around her, biding his time. He was ready for Beth. She wasn’t ready for him. Not then. She was as beautiful and fragile as a jungle orchid. It had been love at first sight for Sam. He’d decided she should be surrounded by children; he’d pictured her, a baby—his—at her naked breast. He’d never felt this alien blend of lust, love, tenderness and fear for any woman in his life. He wanted her with an intensity he’d never felt for any woman. Ever.

It was damned unsettling, he thought, shoving aside a six-foot-long palm frond. He’d gone way past unsettled by the unexpected mixture of emotions he’d felt for this woman from the start and directly into determination and a strange kind of peace.

A loud croaking sound, followed by a guttural rurr, rurr, rurr, sounded several feet to the left.

“What do you think that is?”

“Colobus monkey. He’s been following us for a while.” Sam could see the little guy’s bright, inquisitive eyes as he swung by his tail from a nearby branch, waiting for them to move on.

“As long as it isn’t a damn bird,” Beth muttered under her breath, making Sam grin.

While a portion of his mind was aware of every small movement in the foliage around them, and his ears engaged in IDing every noise, a small compartment of his brain was reserved for flashing memories of Beth.

According to her patients she was an excellent GP. And sweet. And inordinately kind. And compassionate. And attentive. Everyone in the small Montana town adored Dr. Beth.

Sam had taken one look at sweet Dr. Beth’s marmalade-colored hair, creamy freckled skin, and big brown eyes and fallen for her like the proverbial ton of bricks. He’d wanted to strip her and count every freckle. Unfortunately, five minutes after meeting her he’d discovered she was married. Fifteen minutes after that he’d gotten an earful from Traci at the diner about the idiot she was married to.

They’d married while both were in med school. Beth and Rob were more like friends than lovers, which Sam found good to know. Rob was a nice guy, Traci told him. Too bad he’d fallen in love with a woman he’d met on the Internet. Dr. Beth was being really decent about it and doing what she could to expedite the paperwork to get it over with as quickly and quietly as possible.

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