Her Hard to Resist Husband (7 page)

Okay, maybe “desire” was the wrong word to use. Because put them in a room alone together and they tended to combust at frightening speed. She remembered her fury as she’d walked into that village to confront him on their first meeting. She’d heard there was an epidemiologist heading her way down the river but that he was taking his sweet time.

Unwilling to wait for him to stop at every village and sample the local cuisine, she’d powered back upriver and stomped her way to the heart of the village. He’d been standing in the middle of a group of men, a big smile on his face. She’d opened her mouth to throw a vile accusation his way, only to have the words stop in her throat the second their eyes had met.

He’d stared at her for several long seconds then one eyebrow had quirked upwards. “Are you here for me?”

“I…I…” Realizing she’d looked like a fool, she’d drawn herself up to her full height and let him have it.

She’d let him have it again two days later. In an entirely different way.

Oh, God. She could
not
be in a room alone with the man if she could help it. So what was she going to do?

Stay with her patients as much as possible, that’s what. She’d already been here for almost eight hours. And it was now a few minutes past the end of her shift. If she knew Ben, he would make them all stick to the schedule he’d drawn up—whether they wanted to or not.

Even as she thought it, she reached Cleo’s bed and leaned over her. The girl gave her a tremulous smile, which she returned.

“Hey, how are you doing?”

“Sleepy, and my head hurts.” Cleo’s voice was a thread of sound.

“I know.” Headaches were one of the symptoms of the plague, but Cleo’s episode didn’t seem to be progressing as rapidly as Daniel’s had. “You need to rest. I’m sure—”

Something cool and moist hit her left ankle and swept up the back of her leg until it reached the bottom of her shorts. Stifling a scream, she straightened and spun around to find empty air. She lowered her gaze and spied Ben, on his haunches, about a foot away, a spray bottle in his hand. Half-thought words bubbled on her tongue but didn’t find an exit.

He got two more squirts in before she found her voice. “What do you think you’re doing?”

Holding the pump bottle up, he said. “We have a room full of sick people. All we need is to have a dengue outbreak on top of everything.”

Repellant. Ah. She got it.

But why was he the one spraying it on her? He could have just handed her the bottle and ordered her to put it on.

“You were busy,” he said, as if reading her thoughts. “And sometimes with you it’s easier to act than to argue.”

Like their first kiss? When he’d dragged her to him and planted his lips on hers without so much as a “May I?”

She swallowed, hoping he couldn’t read the direction of her thoughts. Or the fact that seeing him kneeling in front of her reminded her of other times when he’d done just that.

Before she could grab the bottle out of his hand he went back to work and sprayed the front of her legs. “Turn around.”

“Are you going to personally spray Pedro and the other workers, too? Or just me?”

“They’re not wearing shorts.” His brows went up. “Didn’t think it was as urgent.”

She couldn’t stop the smile or the roll of her eyes, but she obediently turned around. In reality the chill of the spray against her super-heated skin was heavenly as he slowly misted the back of her right leg. Looking down, she found Cleo looking up at her.

“He’s bossy,” the little girl said. Her voice was weak but there was a ghost of a smile on her face.

Tracy couldn’t stop the laugh that bubbled out, her heart lightening at Cleo’s ability to joke. “Oh, honey, you have no idea.”

Ben’s bossiness had a tendency to come out in all kinds of ways. Some of those she was better off not thinking about right now.

The spraying stopped and Tracy glanced behind her to find Ben staring up at her. Standing abruptly, he shoved the repellant bottle into her hands. “I’ll let you finish up the rest. Give it to the other workers after you’re done. And make sure you stay protected while you’re here.”

With that he walked away without a backward glance.

Stay protected? With him in the immediate vicinity?

She gave a huge sigh.

It would take a whole lot more than a bottle of repellent to do that.

CHAPTER SIX

H
E
WAS
A
masochist.

Ben stared at the figure sleeping in the hammock—her back to him—and wondered what on earth he’d been thinking by demanding they sleep in the same room. He obviously hadn’t been thinking at all, but the sight of Tracy standing next to Pedro had sent a shaft of what could only be described as jealousy through him.

Why?

She could have been sleeping with twenty men a day after she’d left, and he’d have been none the wiser.

Yeah, but he hadn’t had to stand there and witness it.

Even as he tried to convince himself that was the reason, he knew it went deeper than that. Deeper than the desire that churned to life as he stared at the sexy curve of hip flowing into a narrow waist. A waist that hadn’t even had time to expand much before their baby had been lost.

She’d gotten off work two hours ahead of him, just as his schedule had dictated, which was a relief because she’d obviously come right back to the room and gone straight to sleep.

Which was exactly what he should be doing.

Tomorrow was going to be just as difficult as today.

Having Tracy here brought up all the tangled emotions he thought he’d already unraveled and put to bed. Sighing, he toed off his shoes, glad he’d donned a pair of athletic shorts to sleep in, because there was no way he was sleeping in just his boxers.

He slid into his hammock, trying to keep the creaking of the ropes to a minimum as he settled into place.

Someone like Pedro would have been ideal husband material for Tracy. He obviously didn’t mind her vagabond spirit. In fact, he traveled with her on a regular basis, if appearances were anything to go by.

But then again, Pedro wasn’t married to her. He hadn’t had to sit at home wondering why she wanted to be anywhere else but with him. Wondering if, once their child was born, the baby would be dumped in the care of his housekeeper, just as he’d been when he’d been little.

Anger churned in his chest at the thought.

So why had seeing her bending over that little girl’s bed, shapely bottom facing him, made the saliva pool in his mouth? And when she’d leaned further over, the long, lean muscles in her calves bunching as she’d gone on tiptoe to adjust the sheet on the far side of the cot, his body had roared to life. There hadn’t been a drop of anger in sight.

He’d wanted her. Just as much as he always had.

He’d meant to hand her the bottle of repellent with a brusque order to put some on, but he’d been desperate to erase the images cascading through his mind. Squirting a healthy dose of cold liquid on her had seemed like the ideal way to shock her into moving—and shock his own body back to normal. Like a virtual defibrillator, halting a deadly spiral of electrical impulses before they’d overwhelmed his system.

His actions had backfired, though.

She’d turned around, just like he’d hoped, only his senses hadn’t righted themselves, they’d gone berserk. And when he’d heard that low, throaty laugh at something her young patient had said, his stomach had turned inside out, drilling him with the reality of how stupid his move had been.

Besides, he’d had other things he needed to attend to.

Like going out and dunking his head in a bucket of water.

Which he’d done. Literally.

When he’d gone back inside, Tracy had already finished spraying herself down, the shine from the repellant glinting off the tip of her upturned nose, making his gut twist all over again.

He’d spent the rest of the day hanging mosquito netting around all of the patients’ beds and caring for the ones who were the farthest away from his ex-wife.

Now, if he could just convince himself she really was his ex, he’d be just peachy.

* * *

Only two days into the outbreak and she was dog-tired. And hot.

So terribly hot. And now they were up to twenty patients, rather than fourteen.

The tiny house was still stifling, although Ben had figured out a way to combine fans with periodic jets of fine mist that reminded Tracy of the produce sections she’d seen at US supermarkets. It did help, but still…the place could never be deemed “cool.”

Then again, it never really cooled off in this part of the world. Tracy had become soft, working in Sao Paulo for much of the year. The sticky heat that blanketed the equator—a place where seasons didn’t exist—was unrelenting, reaching into every nook and cranny.

It had to be just as hard for Ben, who worked in an air-conditioned office nowadays, rather than doing fieldwork like he’d done when they’d met.

They’d administered a therapeutic dose of antibiotics into all their patients, but they were already seeing the truth of that narrow window of treatment. The patients who’d been diagnosed after help arrived and given antibiotics immediately were doing better than those who had already been ill when they’d arrived.

The statistics held true, with the sickest of their patients continuing their downward spiral. Still, they had to keep trying, so they stayed their course, using either IV antibiotics, intramuscular injections or, for those who could tolerate it, oral doses. Two more had died since their arrival, but at least Ben had ordered those awful marks above the beds to be scrubbed clean.

Amazingly, Daniel—although gravely ill—was still hanging in there.

She glanced over at Ben, who was injecting his next patient, squeezing the woman’s hand and offering her an encouraging smile that she couldn’t actually see—because of his mask—but the crinkling at the corners of his eyes gave him away. Oh, how Tracy had loved seeing those happy little lines go to work.

He put the syringe into the medical waste container they’d set up, and Tracy reminded herself to check on the supply of disposable needles. He caught her looking at him from her place beside Daniel’s bed and made his way over to her. She tensed, just as she’d done every time they’d had to interact.

“Why don’t you take a quick nap?”

She shook her head. “I’m okay. Besides, I’ve had more sleep than you have.”

Something she would know, as she’d heard him get up in the middle of the night and leave their room both nights they’d been in there. Maybe he was as restless as she was.

Well, whose fault was that? He’d been the one who’d insisted they stay together, which had made things incredibly awkward with Pedro.

And there were no real beds, so it wasn’t a matter of her getting the bed while he slept on a pallet on the floor. No, all the workers had been assigned military hammocks, the residents’ original hammocks having been confiscated, along with most of their fabric or upholstered possessions. Once some of the patients recovered, they’d have the added hardship of knowing many of their household clothes and belongings were long gone. Destroyed for the good of the village.

Tracy, for once, had agreed with the decision when Ben told her about it.

In addition to the bed situation, there wasn’t much privacy to be had anywhere in the town. Showers had been set up in a clearing and the stinging smell of strong disinfectant soap had become an all-too-familiar fragrance around the compound. But even that couldn’t totally vanquish the warm masculine scent that greeted her each night from the neighboring hammock where Ben lay.

Hanging side by side, the two hammocks were slung on three hooks, sharing one at the lower end, while the two upper ends branched apart onto two separate hooks, so that the hammocks formed a V. Knowing their feet were almost touching each and every night had been part of the reason for her sleeplessness.

So she’d lain awake for hours, despite her growing fatigue, until Ben—like he’d done the previous two nights—had slipped from his bed and out of the room. Only then had she finally been able to close her eyes and relax.

Ben looked like he was about to press his point about her taking a nap when the front door to the house banged open and a fierce argument carried through to where they were standing.

What in the name of…?

Both she and Ben moved quickly into the hallway, not wanting someone to be inadvertently exposed to the sickroom. They found one of the military police who’d been assigned to enforcing the quarantine arguing with a young girl who was around six years old. Tear tracks marked the dust on either side of the child’s face, and her feet—clad only in flip-flops—were caked with dirt.

“What’s going on?” Ben asked in Portuguese.

“She insists on speaking with a doctor, even though I’ve explained she can’t go in there.”

Tracy moved forward. “It’s okay. I’ll go outside with her.”

“Tracy.” Ben put a hand on her arm, stopping her.

She sent him a look that she hoped conveyed her irritation. “Someone has to talk to her. Better me than them.” She aimed a thumb at the poor soldier.

“You need to at least take off your gear before you go out there.”

“I will.” She spoke softly to the child, telling her it was okay, that she’d be out in a minute. The girl nodded, the wobbling of her chin as she turned to go wrenching at Tracy’s heart.

Ben caught the eye of one of the military doctors and told him they’d be back in a few minutes. They both stripped off their protective gear in the clean area and scrubbed with antibiotic soap. Tracy used her forearm to swipe at her damp forehead, frowning when Ben lifted a hand toward her. She took a quick step back.

“You have suds.” He pointed to his own forehead.

She reached up and dabbed it away herself, avoiding his eyes, then pushed through the screen door at the back of the house. They made their way round to the front and the little girl rushed toward them. Ben stepped in front of Tracy, causing her to give a sigh of exasperation. “Ben, please. She’s not going to hurt anyone.”

Moving around him, she knelt in front of the child. “What’s your name?”