The Beast Within (24 page)

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F
or the first time since arriving at the Sympa-Med compound, Tanya’s heart raced at the idea of entering the dining hut. And it wasn’t the prospect of eating that was doing it either, but the man she would see.

She hadn’t been able to get Roman out of her head since he’d left her earlier. Despite plentiful evidence to the contrary, the idea that he might share the attraction would not leave her alone.

No doubt it was just wishful thinking, but what a wish.

He and Ben were standing beside a table near the one she and Fleur sat at during mealtimes and talking to the other men in the security detail.

Despite the fact that he was in active conversation with the soldier who had introduced himself as Neil, Roman’s gaze caught hers the minute she entered the hut.

She did her best to give him a casual nod of acknowledgment, but ruined the effect with a blush he no doubt took for some misplaced shyness or embarrassment. It wasn’t though; the heat climbing her neck and into her cheeks was pure, unadulterated arousal.

Was she going through midlife crisis early, or something? She was only twenty-eight, but something had to explain the way her nipples tightened to hard points every time she saw the man.

And that wasn’t even taking into consideration the heat between her legs. She’d never had such a physically visceral reaction before. Not to anything. Not fear. Not joy. Definitely not passion.

It was just a little terrifying.

Forcing her eyes away from him, she heard Fleur invite Ben to join them at their table for dinner. Roman didn’t wait for an invitation to sit beside Tanya on the bench at the long table. The other men all sat at the table they’d been standing by, seemingly unaffected by their colleague’s desertion.

Okay, if looking at him affected her, sitting next to him was like a stimulation overload. Not only could she smell his subtle masculine scent, but his heat reached out and touched her like a caress to every nerve ending along the side facing him.

She found herself inhaling deeply to more firmly imprint his scent into her olfactory memory. It was such a primal reaction and she couldn’t help it any more than she could the need to breathe.

“Are you okay?” he asked, sounding like he knew exactly what was wrong with her.

She was not a mare in heat, controlled by her body’s urges, no matter how much she might secretly want to be.

Taking a deep breath, she then let it out slowly, concentrating on getting her voice under control before she spoke. “Of course. Are you settling in all right?”

He certainly didn’t look like he was suffering jet lag or culture shock as so many newbies did when arriving in Africa for the first time.

“No problem.”

One of the kitchen helpers delivered food to their table.

Tanya waited until everyone had been served before asking him, “Is this your first trip to Africa?”

“No.”

He took a bite of food, showing neither pleasure nor distaste for the traditional local fare.

It had taken her a while to get used to the lack of spices, or the different spices in most African cooking when she’d first arrived with the Peace Corps.

When he didn’t clarify his one-word response, she asked, “To Zimbabwe?”

“Yes.”

“It’s an amazing country.”

“If you say so.”

“Don’t you think so?” No matter the drawbacks to life on the original continent, Tanya loved so much about the different African cultures she had experienced. And the ability to experience nature at its most pristine was unparalled. “There is so much unspoiled beauty here, both in the people and the land they inhabit.”

“And a human-trafficking industry that rivals any other location on earth.”

She couldn’t deny that, but it was only part of the picture. “The U.S. has its own severe problems with gang-related crime and violent crime overall, not to mention its own human-trafficking issues.”

“True.”

“No country is perfect, but the people here are resilient. They live and persist in hoping for the future, despite their troubled political past and present, and a terribly debilitating near eighty percent unemployment rate.”

“And Victoria Falls is supposed to be one of the most beautiful spots in the world.” The words were right, but the subtle sarcasm lacing them belied his sincerity.

She shot him a disgruntled frown. “It is, in fact.”

“You’ve been?”

“Naturally.” Did he seriously believe she would have lived here for nearly two years and never made the trek? She couldn’t imagine that level of indifference to the beauty the world had to offer.

It would be one thing if she had no way to travel, but she had both sufficient time and money.

“I thought you were too busy providing medical help to the needy.” Again with the sarcasm.

She would have been offended if she didn’t suspect he wasn’t trying to annoy her, but simply reacting as per usual for him. “Even relief workers get personal time.”

“And you use yours to visit Zimbabwe’s top tourist spots instead of going home to family?” he asked, not sounding condemning, just curious.

“I do both.”

“How much longer do you plan to stay in Africa?”

“My contract with Sympa-Med is up in six months.” She’d thought about taking a year to travel, then going home for an extended visit. “I haven’t decided if I will renew it.”

“You know I hope you will,” Fleur inserted from across the table.

Tanya smiled and nodded. “I want to stay in Africa, keep doing what we do, but I think a sabbatical is in order.”

“Sabbatical?” Roman asked.

“We can never help everyone who needs us. The AIDS epidemic has a huge hold on the African continent. Children die daily from it, and from malnutrition and malaria, just to name a few of the big diseases. If you have any kind of heart at all, it gets to you. It has to. I want a break, not to leave permanently. But if I don’t take that break, I’ll probably burn out. I’ve seen it before. So, yes, a sabbatical.”

“I’m surprised you haven’t taken one before,” Ben said, his voice warm with admiration and understanding.

Roman stiffened beside her and gave Ben an impenetrable look. “She spent almost two years Stateside training for her EMT certification.”

“That was hardly a sabbatical,” Ben said.

Tanya found herself laughing. “If you knew how much I dislike formal education and sitting in a classroom, you’d realize it was more a test of my endurance.”

“You passed the test,” Fleur said with approval and a little humor.

“I did.” Tanya turned to Roman. “Considering the fact you chose a career path that took you out of the lab and into the
field
,” she said, for lack of a better description, “you probably have more in common with me than either of us know.”

He looked down at her, his steel-gray eyes trapping her gaze until everyone around them fell away. “We definitely have a few things in common.”

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T
he air was like a heavy linen sheet pressed against Julia’s face, yet a cold sweat plastered her chemise and dress to her body. It was peculiar, this ability to retreat into herself, away from the pain numbing her leg and away from the threat that lay outside this suffocating room.

A few moments, an hour, or a day passed. She found herself sitting, her limbs trembling against the effort. Guilt choked her, a tide of nausea threatening to sweep away the tattered edges of her self-regard. Why had she ignored Meredith’s warnings and accepted Wadsworth’s invitation to photograph his country estate? Julia felt for the ground beneath her, flexing stiff fingers, a film of dust gathering under her nails. If she could push herself higher, lean against a wall, allow the blood to flow…

The pain in her leg was a strange solace. As were thoughts of Montfort, her refuge, the splendid seclusion where her life with her sister and her aunt had begun. She could remember nothing else, her early childhood an empty canvas, bleached of memories. Lady Meredith Woolcott had offered a universe onto itself. Protected, guarded, secure—for a reason.

Julia’s mouth was dry. She longed for water to wash away her remorse. New images crowded her thoughts, taking over the darkness in bright bursts of light. Meredith and Rowena waving to her from the green expanse of lawn at Montfort. The sun dancing on the tranquil pond in the east gardens. Meredith’s eyes, clouded with worry, that last afternoon in the library. Wise counsel from her aunt that Julia had chosen, in her defiance, to ignore, warnings that were meant to be heeded. Secrets that were meant to be kept.

She ran a shaking hand through the shambles of her hair, her bonnet long discarded somewhere in the dark. She pieced together her shattered thoughts. When had she arrived? Last evening or days ago? A picture began to form. Her carriage had clattered up to a house, a daunting silhouette, all crenellations and peaks, chandeliers glittering coldly into the gathering dust. The entryway had been brightly lit, the air infused with the perfume of decadence, sultry and heavy. That much she could remember before her mind clamped shut.

The world tilted and she ground her nails into the stone beneath her palms for balance. She should be sobbing by now but her eyes were sandpaper dry. Voices echoed in the dark, or were they footsteps, corporal and real? Her ears strained and she craned her neck upward, peering into the thick darkness. There was a sense of vibration more than sounds themselves, hearing as the deaf hear. Footsteps, actual or imagined, would do her no good. She felt the floor around her, imagining a prison of rotted wood and broken stone, even though logic told her there had to be an entrance-way. Taking a deep breath, she twisted onto her left hip, arms flailing to find purchase, to heave herself into a standing position. Not for the first time in her life, she cursed the heavy skirts, entangled now in her legs, the painful fire burning higher.

No wall. Nothing to lean upon. If she could at least stand—She pushed herself up on her right elbow, wrestling aside her skirts with an impatient hand. The fabric tore, the sound muffled in the darkness. The white-hot pain no longer mattered, nor did the bile flooding her throat. Pulling her legs beneath her, she dragged herself up, swaying like a mad marionette without the security of strings.

The silence was complete because she’d stopped breathing. Arms outstretched, her hands clutched at air. Just one small step, one after the other, and she would encounter a wall, a door, something. She bit back a silent plea. Hadn’t Meredith taught them long ago about the uselessness of prayer?

And then it happened. Her palms halted by the sensation of solid stone. Instinctively, she stilled, convinced that she was losing her mind. The sensation of breath, the barely perceptible rise and fall of a chest beneath her opened palms. Where there had been black there was now a shower of stars in front of her eyes, a humming in her head.

And then she saw him, without the benefit of light or the quick trace of her fingers, but behind her unseeing eyes.

She took a step back in the darkness, away from him. The man who wanted her dead.

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G
riff’s train of thought was abruptly broken by a loud yelp coming from somewhere in the rear of the small shop, followed by a ringing crash of what sounded like metal on metal.

He gritted his teeth against the renewed ringing inside his own head, even as he called out in the ensuing silence. “Hullo? Are you in need of some assistance?”

What followed was a stream of very…colorful language that surprised a quick smile from him. He’d found Americans, at least the ones of his immediate acquaintance, to be a bit obsessed with political correctness, always worrying what others might think. So it was somewhat refreshing, to hear such an…uncensored reaction. He assumed the string of epithets wasn’t a response to his query, but then he’d never met the proprietor.

He debated heading around the counter to see if, in fact, she might need help, then checked the action. “No need to engage an angry female unless absolutely required,” he murmured, then tipped up onto his toes and looked behind the counter, on the off chance he might spy the pot of coffee. “Ah,” he said, upon seing a double burner positioned beside an empty, tiered glass case.

He fished out his wallet and put a ten note on the counter, more than enough to cover the cost of a single cup, then ducked under the counter and scanned the surface for a stack of insulated cups. Oversized, sky-blue mugs with the shop’s white and pink cupcake logo printed on one side and the name on the other, were lined up next to the machine. He didn’t think she’d take too kindly to him leaving with one of those.

“Making an angry female even angrier…never a good thing.” His mouth quirked again as a few more, rather unique invectives floated from the back of the shop. “Points for creativity, however.”

He glanced at his watch, saw he still had some time, and took a moment to roll his neck, shake out his shoulders, and relax his jaw. He could feel the tension tightening him up, which, if he were honest, was a fairly common state of late. But then, he’d never been so close to realizing his every dream. And he’d certainly never thought it would come about like this. He fished out the small airline-sized tube of pain relievers he’d bought when he’d landed, but upon popping it open, discovered there was only one tablet left. He shrugged and dry swallowed it. Couldn’t hurt.

He crouched down to look under the counter and had just opened a pair of cupboard doors when he felt a presence behind him.

“May I help you with something?”

Hmm. Angry female, due immediately south of his wide-open back. And he was fairly certain there were sharp knives in reach. Not the best strategy he’d ever employed.

Already damned, he reached inside the cupboard and slid a large insulated cup from the stack, snagging a plastic lid as well, before gently closing the doors and straightening to a stand. “Just looking for a cup,” he said as he turned, a careful smile on his face.

The smile froze as he got his first look at the cupcake baker.

He wasn’t normally taken to poetic thought, but there he stood, thinking her clear, almost luminescent skin made her wide, dark blue eyes look like twin pools of endlessly deep, midnight waters…and her ensuing gaze that much more probing. In fact, it was surprisingly difficult to keep from looking away, every self-protective instinct he had being triggered by her steady hold on his gaze. Which was rather odd. She was the village baker. And despite the tirade he’d just overheard, he doubted anyone who made baking cheerful little cakes her life’s work would be a threat or obstacle to his mission here. “I hope you don’t mind,” he said, lifting the cup so she could see what he’d been about. “You sounded a bit…occupied, back there.”

“Yes, a little problem with a collapsed rolling rack.”

His gaze, held captive as it was, used the time to quickly take in the rest of her. Thick, curling hair almost the exact same rich brown as the steaming hot brew he’d yet to sip, had been pulled up in an untidy knot on the back of her head, exposing a slender length of neck and accentuating her delicate chin. All of which combined to showcase a pair of unpainted, full, dark pink lips that, even when not smiling, curved oh-so-naturally into the kind of perfect bow that all but begged a man to part them, taste them, bite them, and…

Now he did look away. Damn. He couldn’t recall his body ever leaping to attention like that, after a single look. No matter how direct. Especially when his attentions were clearly not being encouraged in any way, if the firm set of that delicate chin was any indication.

“Nothing too serious I hope,” he said, boldly turning his back to her and helping himself to a cup of coffee. After all, he’d paid for it. Not that she was aware of that as yet. But he thought it better to risk her mild displeasure until he could point that out…rather than engage more of the fury he’d heard coming from the back of the shop minutes ago. Which he was fairly certain would be the case if her sharp gaze took in the current state of the front of his trousers.

“Nothing another five hours of baking time won’t resolve,” she said, a bit of weariness creeping into her tone. From the corner of his eye, he caught her wiping her hands on the flour-covered front of her starched white baker’s jacket. “Please, allow me.”

He quickly topped off the cup and snapped on the lid. “Not to worry. I believe I’ve got it. I left a ten note on your counter.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, sounding sincere now. “It’s been…a morning. I’m generally not so—”

“It’s fine,” he said, intending to skirt past her and duck back to the relative safety of the other side of the counter. The tall, trouser-concealing counter. He just needed a moment, preferably with her not in touching distance, so he could button his coat and allow himself a bit of recovery time. It seemed all he had to do was look at her for his current state to remain…elevated.

Very unfortunately for him, and the comfort level of his trousers, she moved closer and reached past him. “The sugar is here and I have fresh cream in the—”

“I take it black,” he said abruptly, then they both turned the same way, which had the continued misfortune of trapping her between the counter…and him.

Her gaze homed in on his once again, only this time he felt like he was the one holding hers captive.

“Okay,” she said, her voice no longer strident. In fact, the single word had been a wee bit…breathy.

“Indeed,” he murmured, once again caught up in that mouth of hers. Those parted lips simply demanded a man pay them far more focused attention.
Step away, Gallagher
, he counseled himself.
Sip your coffee, gather your wits, and move on.