Heart hammering, she watched it fly away, big black wings flapping.
Then off to her left she heard what sounded like a choking sound. Zach stood there, biting his lower lip, clearly trying very hard not to laugh.
“It’s not funny!” She sat up, feeling more than a little surly. “What was it? And what was it trying to do?”
“That was a turkey vulture.” He’d quit laughing, but there was a broad grin on his face. “I think it thought it had found some very fresh meat for breakfast.”
Hot now, Natalie pulled off her jacket. “It scared me to death.”
“You scared it to death. Imagine how you’d feel if you stuck your fork in a nice, juicy steak only to have it moo and jump off your plate.” He started laughing again.
“What if it had taken a chunk out of my . . . ? Where were you?”
“I was over there taking a leak.” He squatted down next to his pack, drew out sanitizing hand wipes and wiped his hands. “Go back to sleep, Little Miss Grumpy. I promise, I won’t let the mean birdies eat your behind, though I can’t blame them for wanting a piece of it. It is pretty damned delicious.”
His playful words stirred memories of last night’s crazy sex in the bushes, breaking through her bad mood and making her smile. She’d never experienced anything like it. It had been animal sex—primal, rough, out of control, and with just a hint of real danger. Though she’d had sex with Beau in that position before, she’d never been able to climax. But with Zach, it had been so easy, so natural, so—
No. Don’t compare them. You can’t compare them. Beau was your fiancé, the man you would have married. Zach is just . . .
What was he?
Her protector with benefits? Her temporary lover? A desert fling?
Too tired to think about it and in dire need of her own bathroom break, she crawled across the blanket, then stood, careful not to bump her head on the rock overhang. Every muscle in her body screamed. “Ooh . . . God.”
“Sore?”
She whimpered, in too much pain to care how undignified it was.
“Let’s get some breakfast in you, and then more ibuprofen. And then you really do need to sleep.”
“What time is it?”
“About seven thirty. You’ve been asleep for a little over two hours.”
No wonder she felt like death.
And then it hit her.
He hadn’t slept at all.
CHAPTER 17
AWAKENED BY THE oppressive midday heat, Zach opened his eyes to see a small blue and tan lizard doing what looked like push-ups about a foot away from his face. Up and down it moved, then froze and looked at him in what was clearly a territorial display. It pumped out a few more, then froze again. “Yeah, you’re bad.”
Zach glanced at his new watch for the time and temp—1320 hours and 114 degrees. He sat up, frightening the lizard away. Then, leaving Natalie to sleep, he grabbed his rifle and binoculars and did a perimeter scout, looking for any sign of human beings nearby. Baboquivari Peak rose to the northeast, reigning over the parched landscape. Apart from insects, lizards, birds, and a few pronghorns off in the distance, nothing was moving in this heat. Everyone was pinned down until sunset.
By the time he returned to their little haven of shade, his hair was damp, his T-shirt stained with sweat. He set the rifle down, munched a handful of nuts, then washed them down with a long drink from his hydration pack.
Beside him, Natalie lay sleeping, her face turned toward him, cheeks flushed from the heat, strands of hair sticking to her damp skin. He didn’t think he could ever get enough of looking at her. Her creamy, almost translucent skin. Her thick, dark lashes. Those graceful, dark brows. Her sweet little nose. Those high, delicate cheekbones. The dimples that showed when she smiled. Her soft, full lips.
Watching her sleep, it wasn’t hard to believe that a woman’s face had once launched a thousand ships and started a war.
Three days max, McBride. That’s all you get.
He reached for a gallon of water, one that he hadn’t yet mixed with suero, the lemon-flavored electrolyte powder. Then he fished through his pack for the bandanas, wetted one, shed his shirt, and wiped the cool, wet cloth over his chest, throat, and face before tying it loosely around his neck, where it would help keep his body temp down.
He wetted the second bandana, then pressed it against Natalie’s cheeks, throat, and forehead, smoothing her hair back from her face.
She stirred in her sleep, murmured something that sounded like his name, then her eyes drifted open. She looked up at him, still half-asleep. “So hot.”
“Hell, yeah, it is. You should drink.”
“I’m so tired of that electrolyte stuff.” Her expression became a cute little pout. “What I wouldn’t give for a glass of genuine Southern sweet tea the way my mama used to make it—black pecoe, real sugar, ice, no lemon.”
“Let’s see what I can do to cool you down.” He poured more water onto the bandana, then gave it a gentle squeeze, letting the water drip into the divot between her collar bones. He caught the drops and spread them across her throat, then bent down and blew across her skin to make up for the lack of breeze.
“Mmm.” She turned her head, giving him access to first one side of her throat and then the other. “That feels good.”
Just as had happened under the bridge, her response aroused him. Only now, having already crossed the line into a sexual relationship, he no longer felt the need to deny himself.
He reached down, caught her T-shirt, started to pull it over her head.
She caught his hand. “But I’m all sweaty.”
“So am I.”
He drew off her shirt and felt that now familiar hitch in his chest at the sight of her. Her nipples were smooth and full from the heat, but the flush that rose in her skin as he looked down at her had nothing to do with the temperature. Blood rushed to his groin, even as the bruises that Zeta bastard had left on her breasts reminded him that he’d vowed to show her tenderness.
She was wide awake now, one hand resting against his chest, her other arm stretched above her head, her gaze following his every move.
He wetted the bandana once more, then squeezed it out, leaving a trail of droplets from her navel to her breastbone. He spread the droplets over her belly, across her rib cage, over her breasts. Then, as he’d done before, he blew across her skin.
She arched, sucked in a quick breath, her nipples puckering and drawing tight before his eyes, goose bumps rising on her skin.
It felt like such a luxury, just being with her like this—a few perfect hours after years of ugliness. Zach savored it, refusing to rush. He had no goals, no plans, nothing he wanted to do right now beyond giving Natalie pleasure.
Guided by her sighs, he kissed a lazy trail across her belly, stopping to taste her navel. He nipped at the pebbled tips of her breasts, then kissed their satiny undersides. He kissed the sensitive skin of her throat, licked her closed eyelids, teased her earlobe with his tongue, all the while raking her ticklish ribs with his fingertips. And then he couldn’t help himself. He lowered his mouth to her nipples and suckled.
She slid her fingers deep into his hair, her body tensing and shifting beneath him, her sighs now moans.
“God, you’re beautiful.” It wasn’t poetic, and it didn’t express how he felt on the inside, but it was all he had.
He slid a hand beneath the waistband of her BDUs, popped the button with this thumb, and found his way inside her panties. He took time to stroke her smooth outer lips and to tease and tug on the delicate inner ones. Then, gathering her own wetness, he stroked her clitoris, felt it begin to swell. It was amazing to think that something so small could be so sensitive. One flick, and her hips jerked. Another, and she whimpered.
He lavished the little nub with attention until it was taut and her breathing was ragged. Then he slid first one, then two fingers deep inside her, the hot, wet feel of her sending a jagged bolt of need through him. But this was for her, not f
or him.
He stroked her deeply, taking care to catch her clitoris with each stroke, watching the rapture on her face as the tension inside her peaked—and broke. He kept up the rhythm, her vagina contracting in tight spasms around his fingers, her nails digging sharply into the skin of his forearm. Then slowly her grip relaxed, the quaking inside her fading to a soft pulse, his fingers drenched with the honey of her orgasm.
He withdrew his fingers, ran them along her lower lip, planning to taste her with his next kiss. But she caught his hand, drew his fingers into her mouth, and sucked them, her tongue swirling over them in a way that made his cock instantly hard.
Holy shit.
Okay, he hadn’t been expecting that—but damned if it wasn’t sexy as hell.
He leaned over her, taking what he could of her taste from her lips, delving into her mouth with his tongue, vowing to himself to take her with his mouth before this was all over and she was gone.
For a while—he had no idea how long—they kissed.
Then slowly, sinuously, she sat up, planted a hand in the middle of his chest—and pushed him onto his back. She surprised him again by straddling him. And what a sight she was, half-military, half-nymph. Her long hair spilled in tangles over her shoulders, dusky nipples peeking through the strands, her skin slick with sweat, the camo of her unzipped BDUs a striking contrast to her femininity.
“I love this muscle.” She slid her hands along his obliques, making his belly jerk. “You’re a beautiful man, Zach Black.”
No one had ever said that to him before.
She leaned over and began to taste her way down his body, kissing his lips, his throat, his pecs, until she was running her tongue along his obliques just above his waistband. Without a word, she unzipped him, reached inside his boxer briefs to free his erection—and kissed the head of his cock.
Zach’s entire body jerked.
She looked up at him, a hint of uncertainty in her eyes. “I’m probably not very good at this, but I want to taste you.”
The idea of his erection in her mouth shorted out his brain.
“Okay,” he said, stupidly.
Okay? Holy hell, McBride, you stupid idiot!
It was more than okay.
It was a fantasy come true wrapped in a wet dream.
She licked him, then took him into her mouth, her hand and lips working in tandem as she built up a rhythm, her tongue swirling around the aching, engorged head, catching him right where he was most sensitive.
Not very good at this? Where in the hell had she gotten that idea?
“Oh, angel. God, yeah!” He muttered something incoherent, caught her hair, and held it aside so that he could watch, the sight of her devouring him nearly sending him over the edge.
He fought to hold his hips still, but she seemed to understand what he needed, going faster, increasing the pressure, until his body shook, his groin throbbing, the ache almost unbearable. Then his balls drew tight and . . .
He lifted Natalie’s head out of the way, orgasm hitting like a bolt of lighting, sheering through him as she finished him with her fist, hot ejaculate shooting from deep inside him and landing in pools on his belly.
And for a moment he couldn’t move, his body floating.
Then he felt her snuggle up beside him, her fingers tracing designs through the rapidly cooling semen. He opened his eyes, watched her amuse herself. Then he reached down, caught her wrist, and in imitation of what she’d done, sucked her fingers into his mouth, tasting himself.
He gave it a moment, then met her gaze. “You taste better.”
THEY EACH ATE an MRE after that, feeding each other tasteless bites of so-called food by hand. Then, still topless, Natalie curled up beside him, and they drifted off to sleep again. But by late afternoon it was so hot that no matter how many times Zach wet her down with the bandana, she couldn’t sleep.
“Maybe we should just start walking again.” She lay with her head on his outstretched leg, one of his big hands splayed on her bare belly, the casual intimacy of being physically close to him like this filling her with a kind of contentment she hadn’t known for years.
Zach shook his head, pointing to the gallon of water he’d kept on hand. “We’ve gone through half a gallon today. If we’d been walking in this heat, we’d have consumed much more than that. We need to wait until dusk.”
She must have let some of what she was feeling show on her face because in the next instant he tried to encourage her.
He stroked her hair. “I know it’s hard. Just rest.”
She let her gaze travel over the scenery. There were dry hills and mountains all around them, one of them much taller than the others. But, beyond empty water jugs, food containers, and other trash, there was no sign of human habitation. No fences. No buildings. Not so much as an outhouse. It seemed still, desolate, empty. And yet it wasn’t empty at all. It was full of wildlife—not to mention people. And once the sun set, they would all come out of hiding.
Last night’s close encounter with the drug traffickers seemed far away in the blazing light of the sun. But it had been real, and it might have turned deadly if not for Zach. And though she supposed she ought to be afraid—they still had two or three more nights out here—she wasn’t. She might not know his real name, and she might not know what kind of trouble he was in, but she knew without a shred of doubt that he would do everything he could to protect her. She just hoped she wouldn’t be too much of a burden.
“Where exactly are we? Texas? Arizona? The Sahara?”
“Arizona.” He pointed. “Do you see that mountain? That’s Baboquivari Peak. It’s sacred to the Tohono O’Odham people. Right now we’re in the southeast corner of the Tohono O’Odham reservation.”
And it clicked.
She sat up, faced him. “That’s what you told Kat, isn’t it? Your secret message, all that gibberish. It was about this place.”
He nodded, his lips curving in a lopsided grin. “More or less. I told her we were leaving Altar and that we were going to cross the border onto Tohono O’Odham land. I also hinted that she get in touch with the reservation’s answer to the drug cartels.”
“What would that be?”
“The Shadow Wolves.”
NATALIE FELT SORE but well rested by the time they set off again, the sun setting behind a thick bank of pink and orange clouds to the sound of yowling coyotes. As she’d done last night, she followed behind Zach, watching where he stepped and doing her best not to get hurt, but her thoughts were still on their conversation from earlier.
Had Kat figured out the message? And if she had, were these Shadow Wolves out here trying to find her?
At first, the idea had filled her with a sense of relief to think that this nightmare would soon be over and she would be home again. And then . . .
Then Zach would return to the life that had almost gotten him killed. She would go back to the newspaper and the existence she’d known before she’d met him. And everything would be fine.
Except that nothing would be fine at all. Zach would be in danger, not only from the Zetas, but possibly also from law enforcement. And she . . .
She would miss him.
After six long years, she’d finally begun to feel again, and he was the reason why. It wasn’t just the situation. It was him. It was Zach. She didn’t understand it, couldn’t explain it, but it was true. The idea of him walking out of her life made the bottom drop out of her heart. She couldn’t go back to the way she’d been before—darker, emptier, and more parched inside than this desert.
That’s up to you, isn’t it, girl?
She supposed it was. She’d made herself a promise to live again, and she needed to keep that promise, no matter who was in her life.
And what will happen to Zach?
Would the two of them be processed like others who’d crossed the border illegally? Would they be detained, fingerprinted, questioned? How would they prove who they were without ID?
One thing was certain: If
they were fingerprinted, and Zach had a criminal record, he would be arrested. She didn’t want that to happen.
“What will these Shadow Wolves do with us when they find us?”
Ahead of her, Zach came to an abrupt halt. For a moment, she thought he’d stopped because he was irritated with her for asking a question. Then he crouched down, motioning for her to do the same, pistol in hand. She did, her pulse rocketing. It was in that same moment that she noticed it—an indescribably awful stench.
Zach seemed to be looking toward a stand of mesquite that stood off to their right. Her gaze followed his, and though she didn’t have night vision goggles, she was just able to make it out—the shapes of human bodies strewn across the ground. “All dead.”
Natalie was on her feet, hand covering her mouth, her stomach revolting at the sight, the smell, the shock of it.
Then Zach was there beside her. “Breathe! Don’t you dare get sick. You’ll get dehydrated.”
He took her gloved hand with his and drew her along behind him, until the horrible odor had dissipated. Then he turned to her and wrapped his arms around her, tucking her head beneath his chin. “Sorry. I smelled them before I saw them. They were hidden by the mesquite.”
“Wh-what happened to them?”
“Don’t know. Couldn’t tell.” He held her tighter. “Whatever it was, it’s not going to happen to you.”
JOAQUIN SIPPED HIS coffee wanting this damned meeting to end. It was already ten o’clock and hotter than hell outside. If Natalie was out there somewhere . . .
“So you think they’ve crossed onto our land?” Ned Zepeda, commander of the Shadow Wolves, looked across the table at Marc and Kat, who sat close to Gabe holding their baby on her lap.
Kat had insisted on coming along, certain that she, as a Navajo, could help. Gabe had refused to let her go without him, and Marc had welcomed his company. As an extreme climber and skier, as well as a paramedic and a former park ranger, he was not only experienced with the outdoors, but also good with a gun and handy when it came to first aid. And he had balls of solid rock, having sacrificed his left leg to save Kat’s life. No one watching him would suspect he wore a prosthesis.