The Lost Hearts (28 page)

“I’ve lost the tracks, Boss!” Duval hollered. 

“Keep going.”  She heard Solomon sneer.  “I can smell her.” 

Alexis had climb
ed about five feet when the lantern light flooded the space between prey and hunters.  She froze, her muscles stiffening like rock, her lungs sealed.  The men moved closer, their faces demonic in the yellow light.  For the moment, the tree gave her cover.  But as they moved to the side, she saw the lantern’s glow catch on the white of her leg. 

“There!”  Duval barked
like a faithful hunting dog.

She felt a pair of hands grope her, and she kicked until she heard a grunt and saw one of the lights go out.  She fell from the tree, crashing against the earth.  This was her last chance.

The universe seemed to pause.  She didn’t see the trees, or feel the earth under her feet.  She took no notice that her lungs might collapse.  To be hunted reduced everything to the beat of a heart, it narrowed sight into a tunnel, and she raced along to the cadence of the life she had in her.  She didn’t hear the pounding footsteps behind her, the gargled roars of the two men as they barreled down the hillside after her.  She barely even felt the long wiry fingers grab her at the neck, or the solid ground as she tumbled over its rocky surface.

It was all over, and
Solomon was on her.  “You fucking bitch!” he wretched, his saliva spraying her.  His hands coiled in her hair and he flung her with brute force against a tree.

“No!” Alexis cried, and she scrambled to her feet.  She sank her fingernails around the flesh at Solomon’s wris
ts and gouged until she felt his blood on her fingers.  Solomon howled, cursing wildly.

Alexis’
nostrils flared.  It was fight or flight.  She lunged at him, her tiny fist slamming against the bridge of his nose. She retreated quickly, preparing for another attack when her face suddenly made contact with the earth.

A heavy hand crushed
her skull.  “Boss, this has to end right now.”  Duval’s voice popped in her ears.  He grabbed her arms, and her head swung wildly, long ribbons of her hair matted against her face.   She saw him stand in front of her.  His back bowed and face low, he slowly lifted his gaze.

“You ready for this?” he growled demonically at her.  “Get her inside,” he barked at Duval, who lumbered up the hill with prisoner in tow.

Solomon kicked at the door.  “Get out of here Duval.  I’m going to take care of her right now.”

Duval stood lamely in the frame.  “Boss.”

“I said get the hell out of here!” Solomon screamed.  His beady eyes swirled red and he threw Alexis to the ground.  Duval shuffled back, and the door was in his face.

Solomon turned to Alexis.  “Do you have any idea what you could have done?  Do you have any idea?”  He shook his head, the nostrils of his long, pointed nose flaring
violently.

“I made a promise to you, didn’t I?” Solomon’s thin lips purse
d with regret.  “I wanted to keep you around.  I wanted to be kind to you.  But I’m going to have to put an end to you.  I see that now.”

Alexis scuttled to the wall, pushed herself up and stood to face him.  Solomon watched her and laughed.  “Do you want to fight me, woman?”

Alexis gulped.  “I will.”

Solomon cackled.  “Let’s do this, then.”  He rolled up his sleeves, and Alexis pushed herself from the wall, the surface of her skin b
uzzing with electricity.  He lunged at her, and Alexis swung her fist.  She felt his eye burst over her knuckles.  Solomon recoiled.  “Okay, I see,” he hissed, blinking through the swelling flesh.  He swooped low and snatched the rope on the ground.  With his other hand, he picked up the stool and flung it at her.  She leapt aside and felt Solomon’s arms tackle her to the ground. 

“I wanted you,” Solomon whined as he wrapped the coil of rope around her neck.  Alexis beat her fists against his face, but he paid no attention.  He watched her desperately, possessed.  He brought his hand to her blouse and ripped it open. 

Alexis’ eyes bulged as he tightened the rope around her neck.  She coughed for air.  Solomon’s hand snaked to her waistline and he loosened the buttons of her trousers.  Alexis flopped beneath him, but it was useless.  His breath came out in wheezes as he squirmed above her.  He opened his mouth over her face and kissed her with desperate hunger.  She saw his cigarette-stained tongue, felt it move over her lips which she clamped together.  He was unbuckling himself when she felt the noose squeeze the life from her.  It took her over completely.

She was gone from the shack.  She was in the sea.  She felt the land slip from beneath her feet and she sank into a pool of infinite still.  She couldn’t remember the man who put her there, or his name.  She couldn’t remember her own name now.  And then she felt the sensation of weightlessness.  He was no longer on top of her.  Now there were sounds, sharp sounds that ripped into the sea.  She opened her eyes.  There were shadows moving in a violent dance.
She saw Trevor and she smiled.

***

Trevor roared at the sight before his eyes.  Murder was his in heart.  He flung himself on top of the foul reptilian man who choked the life from Alexis.  His hands went around his neck and he sprung his fist back, slamming it full force into the skeletal face.  The door burst open and a fat man dove at him, a hunting knife clutched between red fingers.  Trevor swung his leg, and the man lurched forward, his face grinding into the dirt floor of the shack. 

Trevor whirled around to face Alexis.  Her battered body sagged limply in an awkward pile, an obscene knot coiled tightly below her purp
le face.  He lunged forward to loosen the rope when he felt the wooden back of a chair break over his spine.  The thin man leapt at him, but Trevor caught him mid-air and tossed him against the table with a sickly crunch.  Trevor raced for the hunting knife the fat man had wielded.  Both men lie inert on the floor. 

When Trevor turned to Alexis, she opened her eyes.  She was someplace else.  She watched him without surprise.  She only smiled.  Then her lids closed and she was gone.

Chapter Twe
nty-Five

“How much longer til she’s recovered?”

The doctor in a starched white smock frowned in thought.  “The long term effects of asphyxiation are hard to measure at this point.  But despite the gravity of that particular trauma, as well as the others she sustained, she should be back on her feet in a matter of days.” 

Trevor nodded solemnly.  “Thank you, doctor.” 

The
gray-haired man smiled.  “We’re happy we could help.”  The doctor cast a glance at Alexis and nodded at Trevor.  “The nurse will be in soon with supper.”

Trevor slipped onto the stool at the bedside.  Almost every inch of Alexis was ripped,
pummeled or blue.  His insides dissolved when he imagined what she had suffered and he cringed when his eyes reached the swollen welts along her neck.  He felt the resurgence of murderous rage as he replayed the image of the shack, of the man on top of her as he strangled the life from her not two days before. 

He had torn through the Highlands, Alexis slumped against his chest.  Lewis in tow.  He had clutched her as though she were made of sand, fearful that she would vanish with the slightest breath of wind.  “I’ll never leave you again,” he had repeated again and again, a mantra, a broken prayer.

She’d regained consciousness a number of times, though fleeting and always delirious.  And just before they reached the British base, she had murmured something about an onslaught on a village close to the shack.  Something about gold.  Trevor understood well.  He’d been part of the gold rush not too many years back and he knew the lengths that some men would go to get it. 

Trevor sighed through his nose.  He leaned over Alexis and pressed his lips against the crown of her head.  “Where are you, Red?” he breathed against her.  Alexis stirred, and she reached her hand to his face.

“I’m here,” she whispered.

“I’m here, too, Red.”
  He sank in against her side, his arm stretching out protectively across her. He felt her body shake silently as she wept, and he felt himself split around her.  “I thought I’d lost you,” he said over and over again until his throat sealed.  They cried without a word until the golden square of sunlight had moved across the wall.

Trevor leaned back, the rims of his eyes red and wet.
  He resented the bed beneath her, its inadequacy, and stifled the urge to gather her in his arms.  He couldn’t keep her close enough.   

“The doctor says you’re going to be fine.  You just
need to get up out of that bed,” he said, needing desperately to change the course of his thoughts which feasted on infinite
what-ifs
.

Alexis chuckled weakly, her eyes half open.  “I’m working on it.” 

Trevor stroked her hair which spread out in curly waves against the white pillow.  He watched her brow fold.  “Trevor.  Tell me about the men. And the village?  What’s happened?” she asked him.

A dark shadow passed over Trevor’s eyes.  “I wouldn’t worry about those men, Alexis.  They will get what’s coming to them.  As for the village…well, luckily I convinced the British officers that it was in the interest of security that they intervene.  They’ve sent some men and local scouts to the area.  They should be alright.”

Trevor brushed his thumb at the corner of Alexis’ eyes, which pooled with hot tears.  “Everything’s going to be okay,” he told her.  He swore to himself that he would do whatever it took to make it okay.

Alexis shook her head.  “I know.  I know,” her voice caught in her throat.  “I’m just thinking of Lewis.”

A lump rose in Trevor’s throat.  He didn’t bother to suppress the tears that collected and spilled from his eyes.  “We both lost so much out there,” he whispered.  Alexis pressed her palm to his face and pulled gently, beckoning him to her.  

“
Where is he?” she finally asked when they pulled apart. 

“He’s here with us in the hospital morgue,” Trevor said, careful to steady his voice.  “I bribed a soldier and sent word to Moresby.  His father and brother will come here to take his body back so they can have a proper funeral.”  Trevor closed his eyes and cursed himself.  If he hadn’t left them, Lewis might still be around.  It was a thought that wound itself around him, stinging barbs of remorse and guilt bleeding him.

“I’m so happy you found him.  I don’t know,” she said, blinking tears.  “It gives me some closure to think his family will get to say goodbye.  And that you got to say goodbye.”

Trevor sat up, turned his head to the window.  Alexis saw the hard line of his jaw clench with anger.  “Trevor, there’s nothing you could-”
             

“I can’t talk about it, Alexis.  Just not right now.”  His head dropped and the apple in his throat fell.  How could she even look at him?  Dare to thank him for saving her life?  If he hadn’t cowered behind anger in the face of love, if he hadn’t left her there in the forest, she would never have fallen
into the vile hands of those inhuman men.  Lewis would be alive.  Alexis watched him, could almost imagine the script of his thoughts as though she were connected telepathically.  The silence in the room choked her.

Finally he said, “Your father replied to my telegram.”

Alexis shifted in the bed.  She begged him silently to open himself to her, but she would not push him.  “What did he say?” she asked, indulging the swift change of subject.

“He’s coming to New Guinea on the next boat from America, and he’s bringing someone from the museum.  Woodworth or Woodall.  They want to travel with you back to Boston.”

Alexis groaned and her brow creased with concern. “But he’s not well.”

Trevor shrugged his shoulders.  “Can you blame him, though?”

Alexis exhaled with defeat, but her face sank gloomily.  “So I’m going, then,” she breathed softly.

Trevor cast another despondent gaze out the window which opened onto the coast.  The sun radiated behind giant puffs of scattered rain clouds onto the silvery sea.  “Yes, Red.  You’re going home.  I’d say in just a couple of weeks.”  He spoke the words so matter-of-factly, yet nothing in his body compelled him to believe it ought to be.  She was his home now, and he had never felt more whole than in the days since he’d been at her side.  He cleared his throat and steadied his breathing.

“I know I should be happy,” Alexis said, nuzzling her face against his palm.  “Trevor…”

The way she said his name
.  He wanted desperately to believe that what he heard was the echo of his own heart’s desire.  But he would not coerce her, he would not ask her to change her life for him.  “Alexis…I…”

“Say it,” Alexis said, her voice strong.

Trevor reeled in surprise, and a smile spread broadly across his face.  “There’s no need to ask.”  He leaned into her, and his lips brushed the velvet skin of her ear.  “I love you, Red.”

“I love you, Trevor.”

***

“I’m not going to lie,” Alexis said through a sheepish grin.  She unsnapped the locks on
one of her blueberry-colored suitcases.  “This feels a little like Christmas.”  Trevor snorted, his eyes twinkling as he watched Alexis tenderly spread articles of sleek-lined garments over the bed.  His eye caught on a gray silk brassiere and he dangled it on his index finger. 

“You’d probably feel even better if you put this on,” he teased, the dark shadow of his stubble lighting up with a seductive smile.  He couldn’t help himself from reaching a hand and burying it in the mass of freshly washed curls which spiraled over her shoulders.

Alexis dropped a silk dress onto the bed and slid onto Trevor’s lap.  He pulled her against him, his muscular arms squeezing her.  They grinned deliriously at each other.  Ever since Alexis had regained mobility, the two were inseparable.  Any reservations and inhibitions which before had made them hesitant were gone, and they lapped up the minutes together, playing like cubs. 

Alexis let out a happy sigh and laughed.  “You know, I remember the first day in Port Moresby when I arrived to this place.  I was…well, slightly disillusioned.”  She surveyed the room with different eyes.  The room before had appeared as a barren wooden box.  Now its simplicity and cleanliness seemed luxurious, not to mention the queen
-sized bed in its center.  “It’s a five-star hotel as far as I’m concerned.  Even the bed feels softer now.”

Trevor erupted with a low rumble of affection
ate laughter.  “And
I
will never forget the night you walked into The Anchor.”  He shook his head at the image.  “Wearing your button-up dress.  You looked so out of place. Terrified, but ridiculously headstrong.   I enjoyed toying with you.”  Alexis slapped him on the shoulder and giggled when she saw a devilish twinkle flash in Trevor’s eyes.  He wrestled her against the ample surface of the mattress. 

“I’m so happy you’re here with me,” she breathed heavily in his ear. 

Trevor pulled back, his face hard and his eyes burning.  Half of his mouth pulled into an adoring grin.  “I couldn’t agree more.”  He watched her beneath him, her small frame so delicate and perfect.  He grazed her chin with his thumb and traced the line of her collarbone.  Alexis closed her eyes as she felt that clawing heat pull her against him.  Her hands reached up around him.  She wanted to touch him, every part of him, and it still wouldn’t be enough.  Trevor fell onto her, his mouth brushing against her lips.  “I want to make love to you, Alexis,” he whispered, his voice breaking from desire.

Alexis moaned feverishly i
nto his neck.  “Yes,” she said.

Trevor cleared his throat and stabbed at the greens on his plate with a fork.  They had averted their eyes all night, dinner punctuated with wells of heavy silence.  Alexis fidgeted nervously with the pleats of her burgundy dress under the table.  “Trevor,” she finally said. 

He slowly met her eyes.  It was torture to behold the thing he was about to lose, and he swallowed hard as he tried to steady his breathing.  He reached his hand across the table, and Alexis curled her fingers under his.  They squeezed each other, an acknowledgment of finality.

“So,” Trevor started awkwardly, “would you like me to come with you to the pier to meet your father tomorrow?”

Alexis’ eyes fluttered dramatically in surprise.  “Of course!  What did you think?”

Trevor laughed uncomfortably and shrugged his shoulders.  “I just meant…I mean, you two will probably have a lot of catching up to do.  I don’t want to get in the way.”

Alexis leaned forward, her eyes hard and sober.  “Trevor.  You…”  She shook her head in frustration.  “You belong with me on that pier.  Not just because of the part you’ve played in this whole expedition…but,” her voice trailed off, and her cheeks burst with pink warmth.  Why did she feel so uncertain now?  After two weeks sewn at the hips in Moresby, how could they have reverted back to that timid waltz of second-guessing?

“But what,” Trevor asked, his voice soft and insecure. 

Alexis slumped in her chair.  It was now or never.  “Because of what you mean to me, Trevor.”

Alexis lifted her eyes to him.  He sat up straight, and the solemn crease of his brow unfolded.  “Oh,” he said, his voice pinched. 

Alexis felt her throat close.  She didn’t know what she expected him to do, but his reticence wounded her.  She rushed to self-defense.  “If you don’t feel the same-”

“You mean everything to me, Red.”  His voice was serious and gentle.  “It’s just we haven’t really…we haven’t really talked about what happens next.”

Alexis nodded slowly.  “I know,” she moaned. 

“I don’t want you to change your life for me,” Trevor lied. 

Alexis coughed in disbelief.  “Are you kidding me?  I
am
different because of you.  Everything is different.”

“So what do we do with that?  I mean…logistically speaking, it wouldn’t be easy for either of us.”  He hadn’t wanted to say it.  It was the elephant in the room, the thing that couldn’t be ignored despite the enormity of love.

Alexis pulled her hand away.  She gored the untouched food on her plate with a fork.  She couldn’t measure the emptiness that would swallow up her life if she left Trevor, and yet what could she ask of him?  She couldn’t ask him to leave everything for her.  New Guinea was his home, just as Boston was hers.  How could they fit together outside of this story? 

“I don’t know, Trevor.  I don’t know.”

Trevor’s face pulled into a frown, and he cast a blank gaze on the veranda.  He wanted to be alone suddenly, to retreat into the shadows.  He couldn’t string two coherent thoughts together ever since the eve of her father’s arrival loomed as a distinct reality.  He had weighed what he was willing to sacrifice in order to be near Alexis.  New Guinea had always been his home.  But Alexis had uprooted this sense of belonging and had put the stakes in her heart. 

The old innkeeper shuffled by and clucked disapprovingly at the mounds of food merely pushed around the plates.  Trevor assured her the food was fine and that they were both feeling unwell.  The woman lifted her shoulders a
nd removed the dishes from the table.  ‘Why don’t we go to bed?” Trevor said finally.  “I just want to hold you.”

Alexis offered a weak smile.  She couldn’t bear to think
this it might be the last time they lie together.