Under the Wire (28 page)

"They're gone," he said after a moment.

She cocked her head. Listened. Heard only rain. "You're right. I don't hear them. They've moved on."

"They'll be back," he said with absolute certainty.

"I need to check your head."

His hands on her waist stopped her when she tried to get up.

"Not yet," he said. "There could be trailers."

She didn't argue. With great care, she eased back down onto him. Aware now of every breath, every heartbeat, every pulse point where their bodies brushed and melded. Of the erection that hadn't slackened an inch.

And then she allowed herself to think about the moment when he'd kissed her. Allowed herself to relive it, savor the memory of the supple pressure of his lips. The adrenaline-tinged taste of his mouth. The end to a drought of sensations she'd experienced with only him.

A lifetime ago.

"Are you okay?" He ran his hands up and down the length of her. While it was clear he was assessing for injuries, the feel of those strong hands heated her body in ways the close jungle heat could never do.

"F. . . fine," she finally managed. "A few bruises. That's all."

His hands lingered over her hips, no longer assessing, not quite possessing.

The very air stilled around them. And for the first time, Lily noticed that the rain had started to ease up. Not so the pressure of his pulsing erection against her belly.

She sucked in a fractured breath, realized he'd done the same, and met his eyes in the hooded darkness beneath the blanket.

"I'd better check things out," he said abruptly.

"Um .. . yeah," she whispered, part of her thankful that at least one of them—the one with the head injury, no less—had his wits about him. The other part, however, wanted to shut out the threat of terrorists, of possible capture and death, and just stay wrapped under the blanket and in his arms and pretend everything that led to this point was just a bad nightmare.

He shifted her to the side. Then peeling back a corner of the blanket, he raised his head just enough to see at ground level. "It's clear."

Lily scooted to the side as he braced his hand on the side of the boulder for leverage. She froze the same time he did when the screeching scrape of stone against stone rent the air.

Manny stared from the boulder to her. "What the hell?"

"Did that boulder just move?" Lily couldn't believe what she'd just seen.

He glanced back at the boulder and pushed again. This time it moved a good foot.

Incredulous, Lily tested it herself. It moved again. "How can that be? It has to weigh tons."

He shifted around so he was on his knees in the hollow. As he faced the boulder, his big hands roamed and felt it all over before he reached under the bottom of the huge stone.

"It's hollow," he said, and pushed again.

This time the boulder swung wide.

"It's a door," Manny said, reaching for his ALICE pack.

He rummaged around inside and came up with a palm-sized flashlight. He released a handle on the light, cranked it several times, then turned it on.

A slim beam of light illuminated what appeared to be a series of steps that led to a passageway of sorts.

"Is it a cave?" Lily asked.

He nodded. Pointed the light upward where intricate drawings—frescoes actually—high on the ceiling led down the halls to a room. At the far end of the room sat a statue of a benevolent Buddha.

"A cave that was once used as a
dagoha,"
he said.

"A temple." Before Lily could decide if she was spooked or intrigued by their discovery, they heard voices again.

The rebels had returned.

She didn't understand what they were saying, but there was no mistaking the tone of their voices. They were pissed. And they were determined.

"Inside," Manny ordered.

She helped him gather up their gear, then with the trepidation of a condemned prisoner, entered the realm of the dark ... and the unknown.

The shouts of rebel forces grew closer and louder as Manny wrapped his fingers around the stone door and pulled it shut behind them, blocking out all outside sound and light.

Blackness swallowed them whole.

With the flashlight guiding the way, Manny moved slowly into the temple. Beside him, Lily clung to his arm. She didn't say a word, but he knew she was spooked. She was wet, and despite the heat of the jungle, she was probably cold. The temperature inside the temple ruin had dropped by a good twenty degrees.

The cooler temperature helped him clear his head of any lingering wooziness from the knock he'd taken, but it still throbbed like a bitch.

"Amazing," Lily said as the slim beam of light bounced off the interior walls.

Other than their breathing, only a steady, heavy drip of water into water broke a silence as hollow and thick as the dark.

Manny shined the flashlight around every corner and finally found the source of the sound. It was a small pool—maybe four feet around—in the center of the stone floor. Shining the light upward, he found the source of the drip. A tiny pinpoint of light shined down from outside. A hole in the earth that formed a natural dome around the abandoned temple.

"I wonder how old this place is." Lily's voice was hushed as their footsteps made hollow, echoing sounds in the cavernous room.

"Very," he said finally, sizing up the room as approximately ten by twenty feet wide. "According to the guidebooks, there are abandoned ruins all over the area. This one's evidently been forgotten for a while."

"It's in the middle of a jungle," she pointed out. "I'm not surprised. It's also pretty spooky.

"Those paintings." She nodded toward the ceiling, shivered again, and Manny suspected it wasn't just from a bad case of the creeps. "They're, um ... quite graphic."

He agreed and added "explicit" to the depiction of couples in various sex acts.

"This must be where they sent the bad monks," she said after they'd both studied the truly remarkable drawings. "The ones who couldn't toe the line."

Manny couldn't help it. He grinned. "And their punishment was to paint what they were missing?"

"I'm thinking graffiti—idle minds and all that," she said, and he heard, rather than saw, the tremulous smile in her voice. "Of course, that's just a theory."

This woman was strong. She was also cold. He heard the slight chatter of her teeth.

"We've got to get you out of those wet clothes and into something dry."

"We will. But first I need to take care of your head. No debate," she said, bristling when he opened his mouth to argue. "It needs attention. If something happens to you, it's not going to matter if I'm warm and dry, so sit, be quiet, and take your medicine."

Since it was obvious she wasn't budging, he chose not to argue. Shining the light around the room, he found a blocky wooden chair next to what was probably a bed frame—also solid wood and blocky.

He dragged the heavy chair away from the wall. The legs screeched like jungle monkeys as it slid across the stone. Chances were good that he was going to be doing some screeching, too, before she was through with him.

"Okay, Doc. Get it the hell over with."

Manny sat, then gritted his teeth to silence a yelp when she started cleaning the wound.

"Christ," he hissed through a strained breath.

"Sorry. It's the alcohol," she explained as she dabbed at the cut with a piece of gauze she'd soaked in liquid fire.

"What other instruments of torture have you been carrying around in that bag?" he grumbled when she set the medical kit on his lap.

"All kinds of fun things." She rifled around and found an instant ice pack, smacked it to activate it, and laid it against the cut. "This will numb it a little, take the swelling down."

She cast him a concerned frown. "You know that you need stitches."

He heaved a thick breath. Yeah. He'd figured.

"I didn't have access to any lidocaine. It's gonna hurt like hell."

He'd figured that, too. "Just do it."

She raised one of his hands to the ice pack. "Hold this tight against it." Then she directed the flashlight he held in his other hand. "Right here ... yeah, there," she said as she prepared a suture kit.

When she was ready, she drew in a bracing breath, frowned again. "I'm not going to be able to see."

"I can hold the light. Just tell me where to point it."

She looked skeptical, but in the end, there was little choice. She cupped his hand in hers and positioned the light.

"Ready?"

He gave her a clipped nod, removed the ice pack— then swore a litany in his head as she dug right in and worked the needle through his scalp.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," she whispered, and drove the needle into his scalp again.

"Maria santo, la madre de Dios," he gritted out as blinding poker-hot pain had him seeing stars and lightning bolts and clenching his teeth so hard he swore he heard one crack.

"Okay. I'm done," she said, sounding breathless and relieved. She repositioned the ice pack on top of the stitches. "It's not pretty, but it will stem the bleeding."

Beneath his wet shirt, he'd broken out in a cold sweat. He hung his head, waited for the pain to subside.

"Take these."

He looked up. She held four capsules in her hand.

"Antibiotic and ibuprofen. One will cut the pain, the other stave off infection—which is the last thing you need."

It was only then, as he took the medication from her hand, that he realized how badly she was shaking.

"Okay, Doc," he said, "now it's your turn. Get into some dry clothes."

She shook her head. "I need to check you over first. Take off your shirt."

He opened his mouth to protest.

"You took the brunt of the fall. I need to see if you've got any more open wounds. You don't take chances in a jungle, where infection breeds faster than mosquitoes."

Resigned, he started working the buttons. "Were you always this bossy or is this something new?"

"With age comes attitude. Believe me, I've earned it."

Just like she'd earned his respect. Manny undid the last button, peeled the sodden shirt off his shoulders, and tossed it to the floor.

It landed with a soggy slap.

"I need the . . . um .. . flashlight." Her voice sounded a little breathy and not nearly as bossy as it had a moment ago. "And put that pack back on your head."

He handed her the light. Would have wondered at the cause of her sudden tension—if he hadn't looked up and into her eyes just then. In the translucent light of their underground sanctuary, he read her reaction as clearly as if it had been daylight.

Awareness. Sexual and stark.

She swallowed thickly as her gaze trailed over his bare chest. He felt an answering awareness, the same one that had incited an instant hard-on when he'd come to under the blanket and her lush body had been intimately pressed over his.