Rainforest Honeymoon Read online

  Part of her had wanted to believe him, to go back to the way things had been when she finally had a course for her future, as the wife of her father’s successor.

  But she couldn’t seem to shake the image of his assistant on her knees in front of him and she had finally—far too late—realized she could never marry a man she didn’t love and no longer even respected.

  Bradley hadn’t taken her continued refusal well. She had attributed his reaction more to concerns about his position at Lambert Pharmaceuticals. But if Ren’s hypothesis was true, perhaps Bradley was more worried about James Rafferty’s reaction when he found out Bradley was no longer set to marry the Lambert heiress, thereby cementing his future fortune.

  Could she believe Lorenzo Galvez? She looked at him, those chiseled features shadowed and mysterious.

  She wasn’t exactly the world’s best judge of character—she’d been willing to marry Bradley Swidell, for heaven’s sake—but some instinct prompted her to trust this man.

  If what he said was true—and with every passing second, she became increasingly convinced of it—he had risked a great deal to extract her from Rafferty’s estate.

  He had risked everything.

  If not for her, he would probably have been able to paddle his own kayak away from Suerte del Mar, leaving no trace of his identity for Rafferty to find. He would have been safe to report what he’d seen, instead of running for his life through the jungle.

  Instead, he had played the gallant hero, risking his life for a complete stranger.

  She didn’t know what to say or think. The only thing she was clear on was that she’d had an extraordinarily lucky escape, for the second time in a few weeks.

  Bradley had put her in this precarious position, she realized. He held a hundred percent of the responsibility for this predicament she found herself in.

  Their whole courtship seemed like a calculated ploy now. She was willing to bet he had looked around for some solution to his mounting gambling debts and finally noticed his boss’s pudgy, inept daughter. Wallace’s only child, heiress to his vast fortune.

  Whether Wallace had suggested the courtship himself or Bradley had come up with it on his own didn’t matter. She had been stupid enough to fall for it and had even tried to convince herself she loved the man, while he had been after her money the whole time.

  She let out a breath, fury suddenly roaring through her—at her own gullibility, at her father for doing his best to promote the match, and especially at Bradley, for putting her in this position without any thought to her as a person.

  “That son of a bitch. That sleazy, money-grubbing rat bastard.” She spewed every epithet she could think of, and a few particularly creative curses she made up as she went along.

  Ren’s eyes widened at her litany but he didn’t interrupt until she started to wind down.

  “Rafferty is all that and more,” he finally said.

  “Not Rafferty. Bradley Swidell.”

  “Who’s Bradley Swidell?”

  “The son of a bitch I was almost stupid enough to marry.”

  CHAPTER 5

  Almost married.

  Ren stared at her, trying to make sense of her words. Almost married was a far cry from hearts-and-flowers, meet-me-at-the-chapel wedded bliss. He shifted his gaze to her ring finger and felt ridiculous for not noticing the obvious absence of something slightly important like a wedding ring.

  He felt just as ridiculous at the instant heat flaring through him. So she didn’t have a husband. That didn’t make her suddenly available, he reminded himself. Still, he couldn’t contain his vast relief.

  He wasn’t a man who poached on another man’s territory. His parents’ example had showed him marriage vows were sacred. Anybody who messed with another man’s wife deserved whatever fire-and-brimstone punishment was in store for him.

  Hell, just fantasizing about a married woman made him feel wrong somehow. Since he’d done nothing but lust after Olivia Lambert since he grabbed her off the trail back at Suerte del Mar, he couldn’t help being relieved he hadn’t committed some grievous moral offense.

  Olivia continued to curse with vivid creativity, making a number of violent threats that seemed completely jarring coming from a woman who appeared so soft and sweet.

  “Whoa. Slow down,” he finally said. “You told me you were on your honeymoon.”

  Her diatribe wound down and he watched color climb those high cheekbones. She nibbled the corner of her bottom lip, focusing her attention on the darkness beyond their shelter instead of him.

  “Technically, I was,” she answered slowly. “I am. Oh, this is so humiliating.”

  She let out a ragged breath. “The truth is, I called off the wedding two weeks ago after I walked in on Bradley and his personal assistant in a compromising position that’s, um, technically still illegal in major sections of the South.”

  Her Texas drawl was far more pronounced than it had been earlier and she was blushing a fiery red, he could see in the pale lantern light. Sympathy for her washed away his lingering relief, and he wondered if her heart had been terribly broken by her fiancé’s infidelity.

  “But you came to Costa Rica by yourself anyway?”

  She glared at him. “Do you have some kind of problem with the etiquette of that, Mr. I’ve-Got-A-Machete-And-I’m-Not-Afraid-To-Use-It?”

  He smiled at her tartness, then was astonished that he could find anything amusing in this whole miserable ordeal. “Not at all.”

  “The plane tickets were nonrefundable. First-class. It seemed stupid to let them both go to waste, especially when I genuinely needed a vacation after sending out six hundred notices that the wedding was off. I was already getting really tired of hearing the questions and the arguments and the snide little comments. So yes, I’m on my honeymoon by myself.”

  She lifted her chin, her Texas accent thick and sugary sweet. “And I have to say, it’s just shaping up to be everything I ever dreamed. I’ve been kidnapped and shot at and almost bitten by a venomous snake. I’ve climbed a hundred feet up in the air and eaten beef pot roast from a plastic bag. I just can’t imagine how it could get better.”

  He had to smile at her vinegar. At least she was fighting him instead of turning back into that panic-stricken waif she’d been in the early hours of their journey together.

  Sicko that he apparently was, part of him was severely tempted to try his best to give her a honeymoon she would never forget.

  He pushed away his attraction and focused on the more immediate questions sparked by her stunning disclosure.

  “I’m assuming Rafferty knew you were here by yourself.”

  “I don’t know. I told you, I haven’t even met the man. But I’m assuming his people must have told him I arrived groomless after they picked me up in Puerto Jiménez by myself.”

  All this was conjecture, Ren knew, but if Rafferty was expecting a man who owed him money, he would not have been happy to find Olivia arriving by herself.

  His temper would no doubt have made him unpredictable and even more dangerous.

  “Did this, uh, Bradley know you were coming to Costa Rica without him?”

  “I didn’t tell him. Or anyone, really, except a couple of girlfriends I swore to secrecy. They tried to talk me out of it, by the way. I should have listened to them.”

  She smiled a little and Ren was captivated by the way the small change in expression dramatically lightened her features. “I wish I had my cell phone. Jen and Lucy would never believe I’m up in a tree house in the middle of the jungle with a machete-wielding turtle scientist.”

  She seemed a little more relaxed, he was pleased to hear. Getting some nourishment into her system had probably helped.

  “Your cell phone is still in your beach bag, which I stuffed in my pack, but there’s no service out here, I’m afraid. The only cell towers on the peninsula are in the vicinity surrounding Jiménez. You can call your friends and tell them all about it when you’re on your way home.”<
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  “I’ll certainly have an interesting story to tell at cocktail parties, won’t I?”

  As he watched her soft, lovely features lift into a tired smile, he was grateful all over again at whatever impulse had led him down that particular trail at just the moment she was coming from the other direction.

  He hated the idea that except for that small quirk of fate, she might have been in Rafferty’s hands at exactly this moment.

  “You said you were supposed to meet Rafferty for dinner tonight?” he asked.

  “One of his staff delivered an invitation when she brought lunch.” She shivered again, despite the still oppressive heat, and wrapped her arms around herself. “Are you absolutely certain about what you saw and heard? He really shot a woman in the head?”

  “That’s the only part of this whole thing I am certain about, Olivia. The woman was tied to a lawn chair. Rafferty stood over her for a moment, taunting the man with her, then shot her. That’s all I can really tell you. As to his intentions toward you, I can’t say. For all I know, he could have a dozen blondes stashed away on Suerte del Mar and could have been talking about any one of them.”

  She clutched her arms more tightly around herself. “No. It makes sense. Everything makes so much sense. I wanted a honeymoon in Tuscany. Somewhere quiet and serene and civilized. I’m sorry, but I’m not a nature girl. I like good food and Egyptian cotton sheets and…and air-conditioning.”

  “Not exactly on the tourist brochures for Costa Rica.”

  “Bradley insisted we come here. He wouldn’t even consider any other destination, no matter how I pressed.”

  Nothing she said was making him feel any more fondly toward her erstwhile fiancé. The man sounded like a major prick and she was probably well rid of him, though he wouldn’t be tactless enough to say so.

  For all he knew, she might be heartbroken over the end of her engagement, though by the curses and imprecations she’d been hurling around a few moments ago, he had a hunch her feelings weren’t a hundred percent engaged at this point.

  “I couldn’t figure out why he wanted so much to come here. He’s not into hiking, he’s not what you’d call an environmentalist, looking for the whole adventure-in-the-rain-forest thing. A quiet nature retreat didn’t seem at all like his thing, but he was adamant. I should have known something was up. I was just so stupid.”

  She pressed a hand to her stomach as if she was going to be sick any moment, and he hurriedly passed her another of his dwindling supply of water bottles.

  “You need to get some rest,” he said as she sipped gingerly. “We’ve got a lot of ground to cover tomorrow if we want to make it to Port J before the afternoon rains hit.”

  “You must think I’m the world’s biggest wimp.”

  “I think I’ve dragged you through a tremendous ordeal the last few hours,” he answered quietly. “I’d be surprised if you weren’t wrung out. You’ll feel better after you sleep, I promise. Give me a minute and I’ll hang a hammock for you.”

  She looked doubtful but didn’t say anything as he pulled his rolled camp hammock out of his pack and tied it securely around the roof supports. The rain had slowed further, he noted.

  The night was still alive with sound. He found a familiar comfort in the teeming sounds of life, but hoped she would be able to sleep through it. The nocturnal rain forest was not a quiet place.

  “Here you go,” he said when the hammock was ready.

  “I can’t sleep in that. No way. I’ll just sleep here on the floor.”

  “It’s surprisingly comfortable,” he answered. “Come on, give it a try. I’ll help you get in.”

  She hesitated, but finally straightened to her feet and inched toward him, keeping one hand braced on the trunk of the massive tree. He held the hammock as steady as possible for her as first she sat down, then she swung her legs up.

  He stepped away and she gasped a little as the hammock swayed. “It’s okay. You’re not going anywhere, I promise.”

  She nodded a little and took in a deep, cleansing breath. After a moment, she relaxed further. “You’re right. It is comfortable. If I can only forget I’m a thousand feet up in the air, I might even be able to close my eyes for five seconds.”

  He smiled. “Good night, Olivia. Things will seem better in the morning, I promise.”

  “Where are you sleeping?”

  He pointed toward the floor of the tree house. “Any horizontal space will work for me.”

  He extinguished the lantern, checked the mosquito netting one last time, then stretched out not far from her. The wood slats of the tree house were cool and comfortable. Not quite like his bed back at the research station, but it would do.

  He passed a pleasant few moments listening to her settle into the hammock amid the music of tree frogs and cicadas and nightjars. She finally must have found a comfortable position.

  When several moments went by without a sound, he was certain she was asleep. He rolled to his side and had just closed his eyes, when her low, polite drawl took him by surprise.

  “Mr. Galvez…”

  He rolled over again with a small laugh. “It’s Dr. Galvez, actually. But after everything we’ve been through tonight, I think you could safely call me Ren.”

  “Ren, then. If what you say is true, that Rafferty planned to use me as some kind of…of bargaining chip against Bradley, I…thank you for what you did tonight. You would have been able to escape much easier without the extra baggage of a complete stranger but you didn’t.”

  He imagined her there on the hammock, her big blue eyes troubled and those lovely features twisted into a solemn expression.

  “You risked your life to take me out of there,” she went on, her voice little more than a low, sleepy purr. “I just wanted you to know I’m…grateful.”

  “I’m glad you’re safe,” he said gruffly, astonished by the warmth soaking through him at her words. “Get some sleep, Olivia.”

  He heard nothing more from that direction and had a feeling she was asleep before her name even crossed his lips.

  Though he was physically exhausted from the adrenaline crash after paddling for an hour and then hiking hard for another two, on top of a full day of research, his mind churned, going over and over the events of the evening.

  She was right. This would have all been much easier without her. On his own, he could have pushed through all the way to Port J and been sharing an Imperial with Manny at their favorite cantina.

  Hell, if he’d been on his own, he could have paddled away in his own kayak and used his satellite phone to call Manny when he was far enough away to be out of earshot of anyone on Suerte del Mar.

  He still wasn’t sure what impulse had prompted him to take her along, but he couldn’t regret it. Things were tougher this way, but at least she was safer up here than she would have been at Rafferty’s place.

  The rain started up hard again. As he listened to it sizzle and splat on the leaves of the tree and the roof of their shelter, he gazed again at her gently swaying hammock.

  None of this was his normal modus operandi. He was a researcher. A scientist. His world was data and graphs and counting egg hatches, not dodging bullets and killing snakes.

  In many ways, he felt as if he’d been living in a bubble the last few years, focusing on nothing but his work. Like one of his turtles, he had been content lurking inside his shell.

  He went into Port J a few times a month to pick up supplies and have a beer or two, and once in a while he had dinner with friends, usually other scientists or some of the American expatriates who made the peninsula their home.

  But he preferred being on his own, just focusing on his work. Life was easier that way. Mercedes’s death had taught him that.

  From the moment he bumped into Olivia in that skimpy bikini, he had been yanked out of his comfortable self-involvement and into a terrifying world where he had another human being depending on him for her very survival.

  The paradigm shift didn’t sit
well with him. He wasn’t anybody’s savior. God knows, he hadn’t been able to save that woman back on Suerte del Mar. He had stood there behind a lipstick tree and watched James Rafferty blow her brains out without making any move to stop him.

  And Mercedes.

  He sure as hell hadn’t been able to help Mercedes.

  He didn’t like to think about the terrible events of two years ago and the guilt he had lived with every day since then. It was far easier on his psyche to focus on his work, to shut out anything with the potential to make his soul bleed again.

  In a few short hours, Olivia Lambert had somehow managed to pierce the hard defenses he had grown around his emotions. Already he cared about her and was scared to death he wouldn’t be able to keep her safe.

  Not this time, he vowed. He wasn’t some frigging Indiana Jones out to save the world, but she was his responsibility. He would do everything within his power to make sure she arrived in one piece to Puerto Jiménez and caught a flight back to Texas, where she would be out of reach of James Rafferty and his goons.

  He had no other choice.

  * * *

  Olivia awoke slowly, not sure at first where she was or why every muscle in her body ached as if she’d been kickboxing all night long. She shifted to find a more comfortable spot and her bed swayed alarmingly.

  Maybe she had a hangover. Maybe that’s why it sounded like a dozen imaginary wild monkeys were chattering in her ears. She blinked her eyes open and discovered an alien, completely unexpected world bathed in color and light and sound.

  She was in a hammock, she realized. That’s why her bed moved when she did. She was in a hammock in a tree house in the middle of the Costa Rican rain forest.

  Merciful heaven.

  Suddenly everything came rushing back as fragmented memories jostled through her mind—running down the beach at Suerte del Mar with her hands bound, that terrifying kayak ride across the waves, holding on for dear life as a darkly gorgeous scientist drove a Jeep through slick mud while shots rained down on them.

  She decided it might be easier to close her eyes and pretend it was all some kind of bad dream.