He flicked on the torch he had in his other hand. The darkness hadn’t bothered him at all. He’d had the flashlight but just hadn’t flicked the switch. He’d been too busy focusing on the entrance to the caves that was about to disappear from his line of sight.
The cave around them was illuminated in the light from the torch. There was a tear rolling down her cheek. His hand lifted to her visor. Too many layers, too many things in the way. All he wanted to do right now was wipe away her tear with his finger.
‘You were stabbed in the attack?’
She nodded. He wanted to hold her. He wanted to wrap his arms around her and pull her close to his chest. The feelings were overwhelming. He’d known from the second he’d seen the angry scar that there must be a story behind it. He just hadn’t banked on his reaction to that story.
He bent his knees so he was face to face with her. ‘What were you doing in a dark parking lot at night, Grace? And why didn’t you just give them your bag? It was only a bag. Things can be replaced. You can’t.’
As he said the words he almost felt a hand around his heart, squeezing tightly. He hated the thought of someone doing that to her. He couldn’t stand the fact she’d been attacked, let alone what outcome there could have been.
Her voice was shaky. ‘I was working, Donovan. It was my last shift at Atlanta Park Hospital. I stayed a bit later to make sure my charts were up to date and by the time I got outside the lights were out in the parking lot.’ She shook her head. ‘I didn’t fight him. I’m not that stupid. But he didn’t care. He made a grab for my bag and just stabbed me anyway.’
He could see her whole body trembling inside the thick suit. ‘That’s why I don’t like the dark. I get nervous. I have trouble dating now. I hate being alone with a man. It brings back a whole lot of memories I can’t deal with. It doesn’t matter that it’s irrational. I know that. They’re just still there.’
The dating stuff started circling around his brain. Grace was nervous around men? Why hadn’t he noticed? He’d kissed her, for goodness’ sake!
But it was the other words that struck a chord. The irrational fears. They resounded around his head. ‘I can relate to that, Grace.’
She looked confused. ‘But you’re Donovan. You’re not scared of anything. You managed to tackle a guy with a gun.’
He took a deep breath. He’d never revealed this part of himself to anyone. He hadn’t wanted to. He didn’t want gossip circulating about him that could affect his position at the DPA. He’d never been prepared to take that risk.
But this was Grace. Someone he felt a connection to. And she’d just put herself on the line for him. He had to be honest with her. He had to let her know that she wasn’t alone. He could ask her about the dating stuff later.
‘Irrational fears are a funny thing. You’re right. Apart from a few jittery nerves, I wasn’t that scared of the guy with the gun. I knew if the timing was right, I could overpower him.’
‘Then I don’t get it. What are you scared of?’
He pointed to the light streaming in from the entry point. Even saying the words made the little hairs stand up on his body. ‘I need to know I can get out of places. I had a bad experience as a kid. I was trapped in an elevator for hours. As long as I can see the way out, I’m fine. And in most circumstances I can. Take the exit route out of my line of sight and a whole host of things start churning around in my head.’
She looked horrified. ‘That must have been awful. What age were you?’
‘Six.’
‘And how long were you in the elevator?’
He gave a big sigh. Talking about it brought it all back to him. The feeling of abandonment. The silver walls all around him. Needing to pee so badly it hurt. Crying so hard it made his chest sore. Wondering if he would ever see his mother again.
‘Six hours.’
‘Six hours? For a six-year-old?’ The pitch of her voice rose in obvious shock. This was why he didn’t tell people. He didn’t want sympathy. He didn’t want to relive the horror. He just wanted to put this all in a box and forget about it. Too bad his subconscious wouldn’t let him.
‘So how do you expect to collect samples at the back of a cave, hundreds of feet away from the exit?’ It was the obvious question.
‘The same way you expect to collect samples in a cave with no lighting,’ he countered.
They looked at each other. For the first time it seemed okay to admit to a fear. They were on an equal footing. One fear overlapped the other.
The temperature in his suit was rising—and it wasn’t just down to the suffocating Florida heat. It wasn’t quite so stifling in the caves. The air was damper, more humid, but those were probably contributing factors to the spread of the virus.
No. The temperature was rising in his suit purely because of the way Grace was looking at him and the inappropriate thoughts that were clouding his brain. This was what he’d feared. Romantic entanglements with a colleague meant your mind wasn’t on the job. And right now his certainly wasn’t.
He wanted to run his hands through the tangled waves of her hair. He wanted to feel her skin beneath the palms of his hand. He wanted to feel the warm curves of her body pressed against his.
The hazmat suits made them look like spacemen on an Apollo mission. Nothing sexy. Nothing revealing. And yellow probably wasn’t his colour. But Grace? She made anything look good.
She was still staring at him. There were the tiniest beads of sweat along her brow. It just made him want to touch her all the more. Last time she’d had water on her brow had been in the sea, in that orange bikini.
And then she did it. She ran her tongue along her dry lips. It was almost the end of him. He let out a moan that resembled a little growl. Thank goodness there was no one near them. He shook his head inside the hood. ‘Grace, don’t.’
She lifted her hand, palm open, and held it up facing him. She ran her tongue along her lips again. ‘Why, what am I doing?’
She knew. She knew how ridiculous this was. But the buzz of electricity was giving them both the distraction that they needed. Who knew hazmat suits and bat caves could be sexy?
She moved her hand again. ‘Okay, Mr Team Leader. We can do this. Together.’
He took a deep breath, willing his body to stop reacting to her every move. For a few seconds at least his childhood fears had been forgotten. He lifted his gloved hand to press against hers. ‘Together.’ He smiled. ‘Wanna hold hands?’
She leaned forward, lowering her voice. ‘That’s not really what I want to hold. But let’s just get this over and done with, okay?’
No. His body was definitely not playing fair. Thank goodness for padded body suits.
He pulled his shoulders back. He had a job to do. Irrational and unreasonable fears be damned.
As for the sexy distracting chat—they could talk about that later. Alone. Naked. Undisturbed. And Grace could hold any part of his body she wanted.
He took long strides towards the back of the cave, turning and following the path far away from the entrance. He didn’t think about it. He had a clear way out behind him. He had a torch in his hand to show him the way.
He sensed a little movement at his back. The light pressure of a hand resting on his suit. Grace was matching him step for step. She was just holding on for the ride.
A flicker in front of him showed him where the ranger had stopped. He pointed his torch in the direction of the bats roosting on the curved roof. The ranger’s brow was furrowed. ‘What kept you? Did you two get lost?’
Donovan didn’t answer. He swung round and held a hand out to Grace. ‘I’ll collect some samples from the cave floor. You swab the sides of the cave.’
The ranger swung his torch to one corner, lighting up the corpse of a dead bat lying on the cave floor. ‘What about that? Do you want to take a specimen
?’
Donovan nodded. ‘I’ll bag it and seal it.’ It didn’t really matter what had caused the death of the fruit bat. David would still be able to test it and see if it carried the virus. He turned and handed his torch to Grace, waving his arm towards the ranger. ‘Can you light up the area for her while she collects samples?’
She shot him a grateful glance. He didn’t mind fumbling around in the dark. It only took a few minutes to collect the samples of bat droppings he required for the lab and to bag and seal the dead bat. Who said this job wasn’t glamorous?
‘All right, Grace?’
Her hood, lit up by the torch next to it, was casting an impressive range of shadows around the cave. Her outline looked like a monster from a kid’s book. The stalagmites and stalactites were all over the deep part of the cave here. In any other circumstances it would be a perfect setting for a horror movie.
She glanced at him. ‘What is it?’ Her voice wasn’t trembling any more. She didn’t seem so rattled.
He smiled. He was trying not to think about how he couldn’t see the way out from here. It was much easier just to look into Grace’s eyes and think about a whole host of other things.
‘I was just imagining you in one of those kids’ storybooks. You know, the monster in the caves kind of thing?’
‘You’re just all charm, aren’t you?’ she shot back. She gave him a little wink. ‘I’ll make you pay for that later.’ His distraction techniques were working.
He stood up and pushed the double-bagged bat into the sample case. ‘Are we done?’