Love Lost and Found (5 page)

“I thought about getting a tattoo a while back. To remind myself to look forward instead
of back.”

Rick’s ears perked up. “And?”

She held up her arms. “Chickened out. Couldn’t decide what to get done.”

The Felicity he’d known would have never admitted to chickening out. Once she was
fixed on an idea, she hung on to it until it came to fruition or spilled into a better,
more ambitious plan. His fiancée couldn’t be trying to play him; no way was she this
good an actress. “Oh.”

“Apparently that’s a big reason people get tattoos. You know, symbolizing something
life-changing. Or like you, honoring someone you love or a promise you made. Unless,
you know, it’s a cultural thing. They used to do it in Vanuatu apparently, but it’s
not such a big deal here as it is in some of the other Pacific Islands.”

A lecture on Pacific tattoo practices I do not need.
“Uh-huh.”

“Sorry, am I boring you now? Terribly rude of me. Guess you don’t like your majestic
art compared to primitive tribal markings.”

“Now who’s being over the top?”

“So you’re not a cultural imperialist?”

That did it, he laughed. God, the woman’s sass was incorrigible. There was a definite
glint in her eye that made sure he knew she wasn’t accusing him of being an exploitative
empire-builder. “You said you wanted to get down to the beach pronto?”

She nodded and came closer, allowing him to sling his arm over her shoulders again.

He leaned in a little closer to her as he limped, and her warmth seeped into his skin.
Felicity. His early suspicions aside, it wasn’t hard to spend time with the woman.
Her petite frame was drawn on an old-fashioned scale: proper curves, slender legs,
and a pinched waist. A waist that his hands could span. This new her belied those
curves though, and her sass made her seem even sharper than the woman he’d thought
was his equal. And unlike the more reserved, earlier version, this Felicity seemed
very much like a woman ready to take what she wanted. His heart gave a little hiccup
at the thought of letting her take a little of him.
That
would certainly be different.

The uniform pants needed to go if she was going to keep up the sexy allure she seemed
set on putting out, but the peep of her bikini-clad bust from behind her damp, stretched
shirt was all the more of a treat, especially given that he knew he’d seen it but
couldn’t quite remember exactly what it looked like uncovered any more. Opening his
eyes from being winded to see her leaning over him clad only in a bikini top and pants
had been rousing, all right. He’d felt better instantly. A whole lot better than when
he’d woken from his last fall.

When the black of his coma had faded into white hospital walls, Rick had looked around
for his brand-new fiancée. When he realized the visitor’s chair was empty, a cold
fist gripped his heart and his cries brought two nurses running. Had he killed her?
Dear God, no. “Felicity!”

It had taken them half an hour to reassure him that he hadn’t broken his business
partner and fiancée into tiny pieces, after which he fell back into a sleep full of
dreams of falling. When he woke a second time, a doctor was on hand to ease him into
life with a few more answers.

“You’re in the hospital. Safe, and as far as we can make out, miraculously pretty
intact. We thought you’d broken your neck for a while, but all the X-rays came back
clear. A broken wrist, two cracked ribs, and a bunch of bruises that are almost gone
now is all you managed. An extra bang on a rock and it could have been a whole different
story. You shouldn’t really be alive. And you certainly shouldn’t be talking as though
nothing happened. But you’ve been out for thirty-six days. We’ve run scans and your
brain function appears normal. Like I said, pretty miraculous, really. You’ll probably
get a few whopping headaches, but if everything we’ve tested is right, you’ll be good
as new when you leave here.” He paused and looked at his clipboard before clearing
his throat. “Can you remember what happened?”

Rick grabbed the doctor’s sleeve. “We were climbing back down and I slipped. My carabiner
must not have locked and the whole length of rope slid through. I remember the hiss
of the rope, I remember falling, I remember the sound of air rushing…”

The doctor waited for him to continue, but Rick just stared into space, seeing the
rush of the accident unfold in front of him.

“That’s all?” the doctor said gently.

Rick nodded.

“But you remember who you are?”

Rick raised an eyebrow. “Is that a trick question? I’m Rick McCarthy, I run Biogena
Industries, you might have heard of it…”

The doctor fiddled with his clipboard. “I know, we found your wallet. I’m sorry. But
we just need to establish that your memory function is all as it should be. Do you
know what year it is?”

Rick tugged the man’s jacket closer. “Later. Where is she? The woman I was brought
in with. We were on the same line, she fell too, I saw it.”

“She checked out weeks ago. Like you, she came through the accident miraculously unscathed,
all things considered.”

“Weeks ago? Has someone told her I’m okay? That I’m awake?”

The doctor went back to his clipboard. “She left before you came around. I’m sorry,
but it’s best you speak with her directly.”

Damn patient confidentiality.
Now on Tabween Island, he looked down on Felicity’s head as they limped back toward
the beach.
Tonight, young lady, there’ll be no more patient confidentiality.
No more secrets except the ones he’d arranged.

Looking up at the thinning jungle canopy, Rick tried to judge the time. Close to six,
most likely. Perfect. Felicity wouldn’t expect a rescue attempt after it got dark,
and once he’d sneaked off to make his check-in call to the captain as he’d promised,
Rick was sorted for the night. He believed she had amnesia. Believed the accident
had affected her in a number of different ways from how it had impacted him. So tonight
they could start over. They could be two strangers deserted on an island paradise
together. Two strangers who needed to snuggle up all night to survive. Two strangers
who just happened to have great chemistry, great timing, and the greatest excuse ever
to get together.

Chapter Six

“Did you feel that?”

“Don’t say it.” Felicity had felt the drops of rain for the past five minutes, but
hoped that if she pretended they didn’t exist, the sun would somehow come out and
make everything okay. Of course, the sun had already started its rapid tropical descent,
and the clouds that swathed what glimpses of sky she could see through the trees were
black enough to threaten even the brightest of spirits.

“At least we made it to the beach before dark.”

Felicity’s head jerked up and,
yes,
she almost hooted as she saw the golden sand and water through the leaves ahead of
them. But when they finally broke the cover of the trees, the few drops of rain turned
into something much heavier. And much wetter.

Still, she abandoned Rick at the edge of the trees and did a quick run across and
down the sand to check that there wasn’t a rescue party that just happened to be waiting
to take her back to a shower, a warm bed, and George’s hot oil hair treatment. She
put a hand up to her head. Yep. Her bird’s nest was back.
At least I have a damn good excuse.

“We should make shelter,” Richard said when she returned. “I found some palm fronds,
but I don’t really know what I’m doing. I figured I’d wait for the expert.”

“What makes you think I’m an expert?”

“Aren’t you? I just thought, when you bound my ankle…”

The disappointment in his voice softened her a little. “Maybe I am and I just don’t
know it,” she said. “Give those to me and let’s get back under the trees where it’s
not as wet.”

They moved back farther under the trees and sat, Felicity acutely aware of Rick’s
eyes on her. After a few fruitless minutes with the palm fronds, she sighed. “You
don’t happen to have a penknife on you?”

“Maybe?” He rummaged through his bag and pulled out not only a penknife, but a candy
bar and bag of nuts.

“Holdout,” she accused him, unable to stop herself from grinning. “What else is in
there?”

He pulled out a worn copy of
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time
. “This and a pen. Oh, and an empty bottle. I drank the water ages ago.”

“Hmm. Guess you weren’t planning on an overnight stay.” She sighed and added, “At
least you had the decency to pack chocolate.”

With the knife to help her, she managed to weave a sort of rope and threaded a bunch
of palm fronds together to make a roof over Rick that kept out the rain remarkably
well. Just as they had when she’d bound Rick’s ankle, she found her hands moving as
if they knew what to do. The sense of satisfaction when she finished the shelter was
more than she’d ever had on the cruise ship nearly the whole time she’d been working
there. “Maybe I was some sort of survival nut.”

“What did you say?” Rick almost leaped on her words.

“Nothing. I was just saying it would be good if we had a survival nut here to help.”
You don’t miss a thing, do you?
“How are you doing? Your head okay?”

“Not too bad,” he said quickly, putting a hand to his forehead.

“Good. Move over.” She shuffled out of the rain and realized she hadn’t made the shelter
nearly big enough. “Sorry it’s a bit tight,” she said, wringing out the bottom of
her shirt.

“The shelter is great. Getting your shirt dry, however, will probably work better
if you take it off.”

“Nice try, buddy,” she said. “Now hand over that candy bar, and don’t think I’m going
to give you the biggest half just because it came out of your bag.”

He laughed, and despite their situation, she found the sound energizing. It still
threatened to pull her nerve endings out through her skin if she let herself think
too hard on it, but having spent the day with him, and resigned to having to spend
the night with him as well, Felicity decided to try to enjoy the sensation rather
than let it freak her out. A little stimulation was probably a good thing in a survival
setting. She chuckled at herself.

“What’s so funny?”

“Just, you know. Two strangers stranded on a desert island. Sounds dramatic. Only
there’s a full cruise ship not too far away, with every luxury we could wish for.”

He paused and sucked slowly on his piece of chocolate, licking his fingers to get
the last of it off and clearly relishing the act as well as the candy.

Don’t. Look.

“Strangers, hey? I guess that’s almost romantic,” he said, turning to her. Even in
the dimming light, she could see the focus in his eyes. Not very different from the
X-ray look he’d given her the day before.

“You’re right,” she said, pretending brightness. “Perhaps I should know a little more
about you so we can put this time to good use. Best I help you make your decision
about Adventurer Cruises before we get back, don’t you think?”

“Shouldn’t it be me asking you the questions?”

“Oh, there’s nothing else you want to know about me. But maybe this is all a ruse.”
She looked at him, eyes narrowed. “Squillionaire investor, turns up on a cruise ship.
There’s bound to be some scandal in there. Come on, out with it. You been having an
affair with the captain’s daughter?”

He snorted. “He has a daughter? Poor girl.”

Sense of humor. Tick.
“You’re not a fan of our supreme commander?”

“Certainly won’t be writing him love letters after all this is over. Not that I’d
tell him that, of course.”

“Thank God. Do you know how hard it’s been for me to hold my tongue? Hang on.” She
squinted her eyes at him in the dimming light. “This isn’t a trick?”

“No. Me not liking your captain isn’t a trick. He just seems to be a bit…”

“Of an ass?”

He snorted. “Probably. Yes. Short-man syndrome, I imagine.”

“Exactly. Good to see you’re not going to be as uptight as yesterday. Or maybe that
fall has sorted you out? How are you feeling?”

“Fine. Mostly. Good to know you care.” He shuffled a little closer to her.

Easy.
“So, you’re going to keep playing the mystery card, then? You’re Richard McCashin,
you’re loaded, and you like to wear impractical clothing.”

“Linen jackets aren’t that impractical. If you like crushed jackets. They soak up
the water well,” he said.

Damn if he didn’t have a sense of humor about his stupid jacket as well. That was
a bonus. Maybe she
could
take the night to get to know the guy properly, woo him within an inch of his credit
limit, and return a hero to the ship.
That
would definitely get her a grace period with Captain Atkinson. Was that really the
only reason she wanted to get to know Cashypants properly?
Calm down, girl. Mysterious loaded stranger is definitely a Brendon and someone the
new you should avoid.

“Do you think it’ll get cold tonight?”

Felicity had to shake herself out of her thoughts. “Sorry?”

“I know we’re in the tropics. But does it get cold at night? I don’t remember.”

She looked at Richard McCashin with his ankle bandaged in palm leaf and his expensive
clothes a complete mess.
Poor dude. If I’ve been bitchy, I’m sorry.
She was, too. The longer she spent with him, the less he seemed such a shark. In
fact, he even seemed kinda
nice,
when he smiled. Felicity bit her lip. That smile certainly made her feel all sorts
of…
Stop it
. What she thought of him
or
how he made her feel was irrelevant right now.

“It’s been raining but there’s probably some dry foliage under all this tree debris.
I could try to start a fire?” she ventured.

“Like with twigs and rubbing sticks together?”

“I guess. Unless that candy bar happened to come with matches?”

It wasn’t exactly cold, and they didn’t really need to signal for assistance as help
was sure to come in the morning, but the temperature
would
drop a little during the night and a fire was always comforting. “We could use a
few pages from your book to start it. That’d be easier.”

Rick grabbed his bag to his chest in mock horror. “Heathen. You would burn a book
just for measly comfort?”

She laughed and stood to paw through the area around them in the semidarkness.

After she gathered together a bundle of leaves, twigs, and larger sticks, she took
one of the most promising pieces and rubbed it along the split groove of another.

“Does that really work?” he said as he peered over her shoulder.

“It does in the movies, smart-ass.”
So much for being nice. He’s probably secretly crapping his pants about being out
here with a stranger with bird’s-nest hair.

Felicity bit her tongue and kept rubbing. As she blew on the tiny collection of dried
ferns she’d put in the grove, she suddenly smelled smoke. “Hey, it’s working. Look,
it’s smoking!”

“What do you know. Hollywood got it right.”

Increasing her friction, Felicity leaned into her smoking sticks, leaning a bit too
hard. “Ouch! Dammit.” A piece of wood broke off and embedded itself in her hand.

“Come here.”

Pissed with herself for getting carried away, she practically flounced over to him
and put out her hand. Holding it up under the half moon’s light, Richard held her
palm gently; then, before she realized what he was doing, he began to suck at the
splinter.

Holy flaming…
“What the—?”

“Got it.” He pulled back from her hand and took a small piece of wood from his mouth.

“Right. Thanks. Don’t think we’ll be having a fire tonight, though. Sorry.” She tucked
her hand in her armpit, the palm still throbbing from the heat his mouth had induced
far more than anything the splinter had done.

He leaned over her and took the two pieces of wood she’d thrown down in disgust.

“If you get it going, you realize I may have to hate you.”

“No, you won’t.”

Maybe his technique was better, or maybe she’d been closer than she realized, but
within minutes, a flame had caught on the dried ferns and he was adding it to the
carefully stacked leaves and twigs she’d collected.

“Humph.”

“You got it going. I wouldn’t have been able to do it otherwise.”

Don’t think I don’t know that, buddy.
Watching him lean into the small fire and gently build it up was kinda hot, however,
and strangely comforting. In fact, being out here with him as company was strangely
comforting too.
Weird. Watch yourself, lady. He’s another Brendon for sure. A shark. A VIP.
And
a passenger.

But when Richard sat back next to her in their shelter, she didn’t resist as he wiggled
closer than was strictly necessary. They sat quietly, watching the flames dance and
eat up the wood to grow steadily bigger. Mostly sheltered from the rain by the jungle
canopy, the fire licked patterns in the dark, leaving orange tracers in Felicity’s
vision. With the steady
thuck thuck thuck
of the fat tropical raindrops on the palms above, the gentle
hiss
and
haaa
of the tide in and out on the beach, and the crackle of the fire, the world seemed
peaceful. Easy with itself. Maybe she used to go camping. Or maybe it was just nice
to sit with a hot male body beside her in companionable silence. Felicity stole a
glance at Richard and started when she found him looking at her, his X-ray eyes trained
on her.

“If I had to be stuck on a tropical island with no food and no help, I’d choose to
do it with you again,” Richard said, his voice a soft growl that fitted uncannily
with the jungle setting.

“I’m not sure I can say the same,” Felicity said in an affected drawl. Wouldn’t she?
Why the hell not? “Think I’d probably choose someone I knew a little better.”

She felt him tense. “Everyone has to start somewhere, don’t they? Why couldn’t we
just start now?”

“That’s a whole other conversation. We were talking about hypotheticals.”

“Okay. So what if we start to get to know each other now?” He put out his hand and
the firelight caught the glitter in his dark eyes. “I’m Rick.”

“I thought you called yourself Richard?” she said.

A slight pause.

“Yes, I do. But Rick, Richard, same thing.” Another pause. “Anyway, I’m Rick. And
I’m loaded. Apparently.”

Felicity laughed and took his hand, bracing herself for impact. “I’m Felicity. I’m
not going bankrupt anytime soon, but I’m no squillionaire. Definitely.”

“See? That wasn’t so bad,” he said, not letting go of her hand.

Felicity’s eyes flickered down to his lips—his full, ready, moist lips—and she let
herself lean just a little closer.

“We’re on a deserted tropical island. The moon is out, the fire’s lit. I don’t think
I’d rather be anywhere else at the moment,” he said, and it was as if his voice oozed
through the air, wrapping itself around her shoulders like warm water, then eased
down her spine to pull her closer. It felt right. It felt familiar. It felt…
Whoa! You’re supposed to be returning him safe and sound, not sampling his taste buds.
She hadn’t reacted this way since the accident, but with her body desperately trying
to betray her common sense, she wondered if it happened to the old Felicity all the
time. Perhaps the old Felicity had been a man magnet, despite her Spartan, workaholic’s
apartment.
Good one.
She hid her smile at the unlikeliness of it.
You were a loner and a workaholic, period. This little flutterfest is just a fantasy.
And a
bad
idea. “We better get some rest in case it’s a long wait for the boat tomorrow. You
had a nasty fall. Don’t want you all groggy in the morning,” she said quickly, pulling
back and shuffling her butt as far away as their tiny shelter allowed.

“Of course.”

Was that a sigh?
Nice to know he’s disappointed.
It
was
nice. In fact, it was nice to feel…what, exactly? Desired? No, she’d been desired
plenty back on board. But Rick’s attentions felt more real somehow. As if there was
a possibility of a true happily ever after.
Again with the fairy tales? Maybe he’s got a white horse hiding in that bag of his.