Wild Orchids (3 page)

"What will he do when you don't turn up? Hubby, I mean?"

"I imagine he will call the local police. And possibly the American Embassy. He will be out of his mind with worry. I have very regular habits."

"I can believe that." The words were dry. He sent a quick assessing glance over her that left her with the impression that he did not find her particularly attractive.

Ridiculously, Lora felt a little stab of feminine pique. She was no raving beauty, she knew, but she was generally considered reasonably pretty. Her sky blue sundress and flat white sandals were inexpensive but immaculate. Perhaps she was a little too generously endowed with breasts and hips, but the men of her acquaintance had never seemed to mind, and anyway her waist and legs were slender. The chin-length pageboy style of her fair hair was possibly a little staid (Janice thought so), but it was neat and shining, even in this heat. Her face would never launch a thousand ships, but it was well enough: oval in shape, with a softly rounded chin and forehead, and cheeks to match—she had often despaired of finding her cheekbones, although she knew they had to be in there somewhere—and a small, pert nose and well-shaped lips that were neither too full nor too thin. Nothing objectionable there at all. Her eyes were her best feature, large and guilelessly blue, innocent eyes her friends often said. They were greatly helped by a generous coating of black mascara on both top and bottom lashes; like her hair, her lashes were fair, although they were reasonably long and thick. They just needed a little enhancement. But because of the blazing heat and dense humidity, she wasn't wearing any mascara at the moment, or any other makeup, for that matter. She had found that it disappeared after a scant half hour in this climate. She had put on a pink lip gloss before she had left the hotel, but from the dry feel of her lips, that too had vanished. She had good skin—next to her eyes, she considered her smooth, almost poreless-looking ivory skin her best feature—and so she never worried about not wearing cosmetics.

Now she realized that she must be looking distinctly washed out. Like a pale, uninteresting nonentity, in fact. Which maybe she was—and in any case she would certainly be glad if her abductor thought so! Perhaps she would not then have to fear rape… Or maybe he would attack her regardless of whether or not he found her physically attractive. Her self-defense instructor had said that rape was not a crime of passion at all, but aggression and hostility against women. And he certainly was hostile, she thought, feeling her palms start to sweat again as she cast that jutting chin and thin, black-mustachioed mouth—the rest of his face was once again hidden by the sombrero—an assessing look. He had no aversion to hurting women… Yes, she decided, shivering anew, he was definitely capable of rape. What on earth was she going to do?

"What are you doing?" The protest sprang involuntarily from her lips as she watched him extract a sheaf of mingled pesos and dollars and her traveler's checks—several hundred dollars' worth—from the inner compartment of her billfold.

"What does it look like?" He was stuffing the money into the front pocket of his jeans, clearly unconcerned that she had seen him do so. He was robbing her, she thought indignantly, but in almost the same instant realized that there was nothing she could do about it. He was likely to do far worse than rob her if she could not think of a way to prevent him.

She said nothing more, just stared out at the road and continued to drive. Tepid air blew in spurts from the air conditioning vents. Her body was beginning to stick to the vinyl seat even through her dress. Rolling down a window would be worse than useless with the enervating heat outside— if he would even permit her to do so. She risked another quick sideways look. He was sweating, too…

Once they were within the city limits, which would only be another few minutes, she would make her move, she decided. If necessary, she would run the car into the side of a building.

But she would escape, or die in the attempt. Better to go down fighting than to wait for him to do
his
worst…

"Pull over."

The command was so unexpected that Lora gaped at him.

"I said pull over." The menace was definitely back in his voice. Lora looked around in alarm. They were still some distance outside Chichen Itza, and had just come around a bend in the road. There was not a car, a person, or even so much as a dog in sight. The tropical rain forest, with its profusion of trees and other vegetation, grew close to the road. On the left there was a little layby which, she supposed, was designed to allow cars to turn around. The setup was altogether too desolate for Lora's peace of mind. With inescapable dread she imagined his intent: he meant to kill her, and whatever else he intended to do with her, here, before she had a chance to reach another town and perhaps try to escape. Out here, all alone with him, she would be at his mercy…

If she was going to act, it had to be now.

She slammed on the brakes as hard as she could, sending the car skidding sideways with a protesting squeal. Her captor was thrown violently forward—so was she, but she had expected the car's motion and so avoided striking her head on the windshield as he did, with considerable force, too, from the sound of the crack and his resultant cursing. Her left hand found the door latch and released it. While the motion of the car sent the door careening open, her right hand pushed against the wheel and she was suddenly flying through space to land with considerable force on the roadway. Her knees and hands, which bore the brunt of the impact, hurt horribly. But there was no time to reflect on that. With a single scared glance over her shoulder at the car—which was now traveling fractionally more slowly toward the dense line of trees at the opposite side of the road—Lora scrambled to her feet and started to run as if her life depended on it. Which, she realized as she heard the crash as the car made contact with the trees, it probably did.

Chapter II

He was chasing her. Lora knew it before she saw him, before she heard the pounding of his feet on the pavement or the rough pant of his breathing. She could sense him coming behind her like something out of a nightmare. She ran as she had never run before in her life, ran until her heart felt as though it would burst and her lungs threatened to explode from lack of air, knowing all the while that it would be useless. He was going to catch her…

He did. She felt his hand close on her hair, yanking her painfully backward. She cried out, staggering as her head was wrenched almost off her neck, one hand clutching mindlessly at his where it made a tight fist in her hair. She was being dragged back against a hard, huge overheated body, enveloped by the smell of sweat and just plain man, crushed by a steel-muscled arm that locked around her neck… Her head was forced back against his massive shoulder. He was not wearing the sombrero; the brilliant sunlight blinded her as she looked up into this face, trying to read his intentions toward her in his expression. Her eyes readjusted to find his harsh features twisted with savagery. Those obsidian eyes seared down into hers, glittering with fury—and murder? Lora screamed. The sound sliced through the thick hot air, hung shrill and shivering—and then was abruptly silenced by his hand clamping down hard over her mouth.

"Shut your damned mouth!" he rasped into her ear.

His hand was crushing her nose and mouth, cutting off her breath. She couldn't breathe! Was he trying to suffocate her? Terror filled her eyes as she fought to get away from him. He held her in a viselike grip, crushing her ribs, hurting her. Her frantic struggles increased; he controlled them easily. His face was ugly with anger, his eyes filled with it. She could see a line of surprisingly white, even teeth beneath the evil looking mustache as his mouth contorted into a feral grin. He enjoyed hurting her… She clawed at the hand that was smothering her, her nails scraping savagely across its back. He swore, and the arm around her neck tightened in reprisal until she thought she might faint. Dear God, she couldn't breathe, couldn't breathe…! Her nails dug deep into his hard-muscled forearm as her hands flew to claw at this new threat. He swore again, viciously. The hand holding her mouth dropped to pull her nails from his arm. He pinioned her arms with one of his while the other tightened mercilessly around her neck…

Facing death, her brain became acutely aware of physical sensations: the harsh pounding of blood in her ears, the salty taste of his skin as his calloused hand crushed into her mouth, the salad that had comprised her lunch heaving in her stomach, the air that was all about her but could not reach her starving lungs… She could feel her eyes bulging as she stared up into the merciless face of her murderer. Her last sight on earth would be of heavy black eyebrows meeting in a vicious scowl over thick-lashed eyes so dark they resembled bits of shiny black jet, a long, high-bridged nose with a hump in the middle and a faint quirk to the left, that desperado's mustache and cruel, grinning mouth… Dear God, his nose! His nose!

Out of the deep recesses of her memory sprang the motions she had learned in the self-defense class to take control of her body. Without even knowing that she meant to do so, she kicked savagely backward. Her heel made jarring contact with his right kneecap. He shouted in pained surprise, and his hold loosened enough to allow her to turn in his arms. She punched him, openhanded as she had been taught, the edge of her palm coming up hard under his nose and driving upward with all the force she could throw behind it. Her hand made contact with a satisfying thunk! He howled, releasing her as his hands flew to his injured nose. Lora staggered backward, wanting nothing so much as to sink to the ground and gasp for air. But she could not. She had to run…

She looked up to find that his hands were already falling away from his face. Twin streams of bright crimson flowed from his nostrils, running down into his mustache and mouth. He swiped at the blood with a brown forearm and stood staring at the red smears on his skin. Then his eyes lifted to hers. If she had thought the expression on his face was savage before, she had not words to describe the way he was looking at her now. His fists clenched at his sides; profanities fell from his mouth in a steady, filthy stream. Lora almost wished that be didn't speak English; she would rather not have heard the things he was calling her.

The blazing sun, beating down on them as they stood facing each other with perhaps six feet between them, could not warm the chill that sent shivers shooting up and down her spine. He was terrifying as he stood there glaring at her,murder plain in his eyes, big and muscular and savagely angry—at her. The Incredible Hulk in bronzed skin and a Hawaiian shirt. Lora felt a hysterical giggle bubble up in her throat. She had always secretly liked the Incredible Hulk… She couldn't run, she realized sickly, he would catch her in seconds… And the idea of beating him in a fight was laughable. She had only managed to break away from him before because she had caught him by surprise. Even that small advantage was denied to her now. He would not give her the chance to do that to him again…

He lunged toward her. Lora shrieked and whirled to run, regardless of the sense of it. It was too late to even try. His hand closed over her shoulder, and he jerked her back against him. Once again she was smothered by the sheer enormous size and strength of him. Terrified, she reacted instinctively, screaming and struggling furiously in an effort to save herself. In this moment of crisis, her self-defense lessons rose to the fore again, and she stomped hard on his instep. Her flat sandal made no perceptible impression on his sneaker-clad foot. She squirmed in his hold, screaming and trying futilely to kick his shins. One of his steel-muscled arms encircled her waist, imprisoning her arms. Then he was lifting her clear off her feet, holding her helplessly crushed against his broad chest.

"Unless you want me to hurt you—and I mean really hurt you, you vicious little bitch—you'd better shut up and hold still!" His arms squeezed her so hard that she feared for her ribs.

Tears of fright rose in her eyes, and Lora realized the fight was over. To struggle more would only provoke him further… She subsided with a whimper, going limp in his arms, waiting for another move from him. If he thought to terrify her into meek obedience, he was doing a good job of it. He stared down at her inimically for a few seconds while she lay against him, quivering with terror.