Escape from Desire

Her protest was silenced by the pressure of his mouth, his eyes hard and warning as the door swung open behind her. The angle of his body forced her off balance so that she had to grasp his shoulders to prevent herself from falling backwards.

To an onlooker they must look passionately oblivious to anything but themselves, she thought hazily, her senses reeling under the impact of so much alien masculinity. When Malcolm kissed her it was with suitable restraint, and he certainly never held her against him in a way that made her intensely aware of every bone and muscle beneath the taut covering of his skin. Time was suspended as wave after wave of emotion crashed down over her, swamping her with the knowledge that here at last was a man who could stir her senses and bring her body to tingling, aching life. It was like a revelation, but so brief that by the time Zach released her, Tamara had almost persuaded herself that she had imagined it.

‘We want to keep them as off guard as possible,’ he explained when their guard had gone. ‘That way we stand a better chance of escaping.’

‘We can’t escape,’ Tamara whispered, turning away from the bowls of stew the man had placed on the floor.

‘We have to. It’s either that or die. What have you got in there?’ he asked, indicating her canvas bag, which she had dropped on the floor.

‘Nothing much. Just a few things I carried with me on the plane. No machine gun …’

Her weak attempt at a joke didn’t generate any response. Zach was already down on his hands and knees reaching for her bag.

Tamara took it from him.

‘One sweatshirt now damp,’ she enumerated, ‘a pack of wet wipes—a girl I work with recommended them for long-distance travel. She’s flown all over the world.’ There wasn’t much else in the holdall—a few articles of make-up, a small towel, two packets of biscuits and some small change.

‘The first thing we ought to do is to get out of our wet clothes,’ Zach told her unemotionally. ‘Oh, come on,’ he added impatiently, when he saw her expression. ‘We’re both adults, and I’m not saying it out of some prurient and infantile desire to see your body. We’re in the tropics, and although we’ve both had our shots I doubt we have the immunity to fever and disease that our friends out there possess, and I for one don’t fancy falling ill up here without recourse to a doctor or even the most basic curative medicine. Neither do I want a sick person on my hands, so if you won’t undress yourself you’d better believe that I’ll do it for you. After all,’ he added sardonically, ‘it won’t be the first time you’ve undressed in front of a man, will it? Or does your fiancé normally do it for you?’

He caught her hand as she raised it, bruising her wrist with the pressure of his grip, mockery gleaming in the depths of narrowed green eyes as they surveyed her flushed and angry face.

‘Very convincing, but hardly necessary. Your morals aren’t any concern of mine. Now are you going to stop acting like an outraged virgin and strip off or am I to do it for you?’

‘I’ll do it myself.’

‘Somehow I thought you would,’ he mocked as his hands went to the belt of his jeans. Tamara swung round immediately, glad of the opportunity to hide her burning cheeks. It was silly to feel so selfconscious, she told herself. After all, her underclothes were no more revealing than the bikini he had already seen her in, and yet there was something about the enforced intimacy of their surroundings that made her fingers tremble over their familiar tasks.

‘With any luck these should be dry by morning.’

The combination of level tones and matter-of-factness made it possible for Tamara to follow Zach’s example and spread her wet jeans out on the floor of the cave, but she couldn’t bring herself to look at him, fiddling with the contents of her canvas holdall until she was sure he had moved away. She stood up and almost collided with him, the shock of his unexpected proximity driving the breath from her body.

‘Now what’s the matter? And don’t try telling me you’ve never seen a man before. Is it this?’

‘This’ was the puckered scar disfiguring his thigh. Tamara shook her head, unable to trust her voice, shocked by the visual impact of his powerfully muscled body, so alienly male; primitive and powerful, the black briefs which were his sole covering doing little to disguise his masculinity.

‘If you want to use the—er—facilities,’ he gestured to the chemical toilet in the corner of the room, ‘I’ll turn my back.’

It was the final indignity. Tears blurred her vision. She had never felt more degraded or despondent. She longed for the shower in her hotel bedroom, for any means of feeling really clean and fresh so long as privacy came with it.

‘No?’ His eyes surveyed her clinically in her brief lacy bra and tiny matching pants. ‘Better not let any of our friends see you dressed like that,’ he drawled, his expression changing suddenly, something approaching excitement glittering in his eyes as he breathed, ‘Yes … perhaps that’s it.’

‘Perhaps that’s what?’ Tamara demanded crossly.

‘Nothing. Let’s try and get some sleep. Tomorrow threatens to be one hell of a long day.’

After the initial comfort of the fleece-lined sleeping bag, the cave floor began to seem hard.

To her left Tamara could hear the even rise and fall of Zach’s breathing; he apparently had no difficulty in finding the escape from their situation which persisted in eluding her.

At last exhaustion overcame the fear-induced adrenalin which kept her mind feverishly alert and she fell asleep, but even then there was no escape. Nightmare succeeded nightmare and she muttered protests in her sleep, tossing restlessly within the narrow confines of the sleeping bag.

In one nightmare they were walking through the forest again, and once more she felt the needle-sharp pain as the flaccid body of the leech attached itself to her skin. Her cry of terror was strangled beneath the heavy weight oppressing her; the years rolled back and she was a child again, turning to the comfort of a small bedside light to find solace from her fear of the dark; waking from a frightening dream with her father’s name on her lips and feeling the comforting protection of his arms banishing the bad dream.

Tamara awoke to darkness, pleasantly warm and comfortable, the aftermath of sleep dulling her senses. At first, confused by the heavy warmth of the body resting close to her own, the arm curving her body close against it, she thought stupidly that she must be with Malcolm, his name a perplexed whisper on her lips, because when had Malcolm ever held her like this? When had she ever felt this weak desire to seek the protection of his embrace with an intensity that went deeper than mere instinct?

The arm holding her stiffened, a dark, tousled head lifting and materialising out of the darkness as a cool voice drawled, ‘Sorry, but you’ve got the wrong man. Do you often make mistakes like that?’

Zachary Fletcher! Tamara bit her lip, closing her eyes in helpless dismay.