Nodding, she obeyed. She always did, silently obedient, as if cowed into submission.
Or biding her time.
Either way, she was helpful as hell, which left his hands free to keep the gun raised and his eyes alert. Her silence was eerie, but Padilla was a sick bastard. He thought about his dead family and swallowed down the need to howl out his grief and blaze through the jungle.
Later, he would have time to mourn them as they deserved. Now was for the living.
Checking the oil, his gun always close at hand, Ramon struggled with images of what could be happening to Lucia or Sarafina. She'd once raged at him for keeping her secluded. Why couldn't she have understood he was only protecting her from twisted evil in the world, from bastards such as Padilla?
Soft Sarafina didn't have half the steel of this woman, Nola, clearing away their camp with quiet efficiency. Watching her in action, though, he couldn't escape the sense that she'd picked up survival training somewhere.
She always scooped water from where it was moving. She even filtered it through her shirt. She watched the sun as if gauging their location.>"Like now?"
"Exactly."
Rustle. Rustle. She inched her way back over to him. "So I can eat bugs'stead of those icky yellow nanners off the tree?"
"If it's the right kind of bug. But you know to stay away from the frogs, right?" Tree frogs in the region were almost always poisonous.
"Mama told me. Frogs make you sick. But what about the bugs? Do we gots the right kind?" She scooched closer until her tiny knee bumped against his. "Yummy kinds that crunch."
Crunch? He could imagine Sara shuddering over that. "I'll check around in the morning for a yummy bug. Although I'll still need to ask your mother first."
"If you're my padre then you could say it's okay."
He should probably do something, like pat her back. Yeah, that sounded right, so he patted, got her shoulder instead, but she didn't screech or anything so he must have done it right.
God Almighty, she was so small. The awesome responsibility of keeping her alive and safe in the middle of a damn jungle crashed down on him. He was so in over his head.
"We should still ask your mother in case you've got allergies—foods that make you sick."
"If you ask her, I'll never get to eat'em again. She thinks bugs are icky."
If he didn't watch out, he'd lose all of his objectivity around this kiddo fast. He'd better do a little maneuvering of his own before she had him rolling logs at midnight to unearth a bedtime snack. "I'll make a deal with you. If you'll try to go back to sleep, and be really quiet during our walk, I'll see about talking your mama into a bug feast."
"Gracias! That's better than a horsie ride. Buenas noches." She slid away and curled against her mama again.
Huffy sleeping breaths soon reassured him he could relax with nothing more to do than stay on guard for prowling animals. She may not have hugged him goodnight, but he could still feel the imprint of her sitting beside him. She was real. A kid he would know for the rest of his life.
What did he understand about parenting? He didn't have any example to follow of playdates in the park or bedtime stories with prayers.
"Gracias."
The repeated whisper threw him for a second...until he realized this thanks came from Sara.
Did these two ever sleep? Or were they both hell-bent and determined to chew on his emotions all night long? "For what?"
"For making her happy while I napped. For figuring out ways to keep her quiet without making her afraid."
Her soft voice in the night brought back too many memories of other nighttime whispers between them. He'd been with other women, but never one who shook him up as much as Sara. Damn, he was raw right now, scared as hell something might happen to these two females on his watch, wondering how he would carry them both out of the jungle.
"It's all a matter of survival." Speaking of survival... "Are you feeling okay now?"
"I only needed a nap. But I can't believe I fell asleep without even taking off my shoes." She wriggled beside him, her shoes thud, thudding onto the ground. "Although I do feel much more rested now."
The trek would have been rough on anyone. Maybe he was imagining the excess exhaustion. She certainly sounded better than the woman who'd fallen asleep sitting up with a toothbrush hanging from her mouth.
For a minute—a minute only—he let himself think about what he would do if everything she said was true. Lucia was his. She'd never lied to him. Using him for Tomas was understandable. Forgivable.