Cajun Vacation (3 page)

Justin Rossi steered his motorboat across the bayou to his meeting point. Birds resting in the water flew off as he sped by, and the mist from the wake of his boat sprayed him in the face. His frown faded as he breathed in the fresh air and took in the never ending sounds of life around him. Money might force him to escort another prissy New York reporter on a bayou tour, but the ten minute concern for the wildlife they all displayed wouldn’t bother him today. He’d take the station’s money, show their reporter around, and watch her weep a few crocodile tears on the wrongness of all the environmental damage. Then she’d go back to her big city life, and in-between her daily lattes, not spend a single moment thinking about the environment. At least until her producers wanted a follow-up.

He’d seen in all. It didn’t matter what state or country they came from, it ended the same. The reporters wanted a quick story they could cram into a five minute segment. Maybe ten minutes, if the producers were ambitious about exploiting the situation. Then nothing ever happened for the better, except that his wallet bulged a little bigger.

His last group, three women, came from NHK in Japan. Out of all the time he spent with them, he expected one of them to end the sexual drought he’d been through since filing for divorce. Nothing ever happened. But when he realized that they only wanted to do a story about the bayou damage to rally more Japanese people into opposing nuclear power in Japan, he wouldn’t have cared if the gators had gotten any of them. He didn’t understand how they figured to link environmental oil spill damage with nuclear power, but they paid well so he didn’t ask.

It had been over a year since he’d been with a woman and his body lit on fire with need that he’d ignored too long. When he caught his ex in bed with his partner, a man whose integrity he’d never questioned, who’d been his friend for years, and who stood at his wedding, he felt the certainties in his life crumble.

Now he doubted if he ever really loved her. Certainly he’d lusted after her for a time. The passion of their courtship seemed intense, but now he saw it for the mere hollow physical coupling that it was. Then he compounded his own foolishness when he escalated lust into marriage. Now her attorney was making him pay the price.

He sighed and steered around a cluster of fallen trees. His phone beeped with a new voicemail and he pulled his cell from his pocket to check the number. The reporter called. She could wait; he was only a minute away.

He slowed the boat as he approached the dock. Rocks, trees and sometimes gators lurked under the water this close to shore, and he didn’t want to hit any of them. He shook his head as he saw the Nissan Infiniti parked in the lot. Besides not really caring about the environment, reporters also professed indignation about the fate of the American worker only to turn around after their broadcasts to drive a foreign luxury car. The hypocrisy of the media continually amazed him.

He scanned the shore for any sign of the reporter, but she wasn’t there. His frown came back. Most reporters didn’t like to get dirty, so wandering off alone into the foliage wasn’t something he expected from any of them. He hoped she had just reclined back in her car seat and he couldn’t see her. He wouldn’t be happy if she had gotten lost and he needed to go looking for her.

The boat glided gently next to the dock. The engine revved so slowly that the noise was virtually unnoticeable. When the boat thumped to a stop against the wood, he quickly tied up to a post and jumped off onto the dock. He brushed himself off and headed over to the car.

Empty. His frown morphed into a scowl and looked down the trail. City people usually had a misplaced sense of their ability to navigate the outdoors. They assumed that simply because someone had cut a trail, built a bench, or done some other minimal development, that nature had been tamed and they were as safe as they were in their city. She probably thought she could just poke around and find much of what she came down for on her own.

He spat, wiped his mouth, and headed down the trail for his missing reporter. The scream sent him into a sprint. No frozen indecision. No wondering what to do. Adrenalin flowed into him on pure instinct. However foolish this New Yorker was, she needed help, and he never left a woman in trouble.

He caught sight of her up ahead, just before she turned behind a tree. His nerves lit up on seeing her, even for a moment, and then faded. He ignored the feeling and kept moving. She was running, but he couldn’t see why. In front of him, by the water, a raccoon scurried across the path. He and the animal ignored each other as he raced by to catch the woman. She had climbed halfway up a tree by the time he rounded the corner of the trail. His mouth ticked up when he watched her hips sway as she unsuccessfully tried to shimmy herself up to the nearest branch.

Now that she wasn’t moving farther away from him, he slowed to a walk. He moved silently across the damp ground. She struggled to get higher into the tree, completely oblivious to everything around her. Even over the fresh air and smells of the bayou, he could take in the scent of her perfume. The tantalizing smell sent a flush of excitement through him. Her brown hair fell back behind her in a tangled weave that reminded him of the forest and how the trees sometimes wove their branches together. He licked his lips.

Her focus on climbing the tree amazed him, but his mind still put her in positions more suited for the bedroom than that bayou. He knew it was too much to ask for. That this be the woman who would break his sexual drought, but if she focused on a man as intently as she tried tree climbing, then it would probably be trip to heaven.

She reached up for a new branch and swung her legs up to a knot in the trunk. Her foot hit the mark and she started pulling herself up when the branch cracked. A scream split the quiet and she tumbled backward. He covered the remaining distance in a heartbeat and had his arms stretched out under her. Her weight slammed into him and his knees buckled slightly under the impact, but he held onto her and pulled her into his chest.

His eyes closed under the strain of stopping her descent. He’d read once about a man who caught a kid falling out of an apartment in New York. The papers lauded him a hero, but didn’t mention all the bruises he got by saving the boy. He wondered if this would be the heroic act that put him into a hospital with some broken bones or torn muscles. Under his hands, he could feel her body trembling. Slowly his legs stabilized.

“Don’t worry. I’ve got you,” he said and he felt her relax slightly.

She had wrapped her arms around his neck and he could feel her breath on his skin. Every ounce of her body radiated heat and it poured into him. Whatever had frightened her, it didn’t diminish for an instant the incredible sex appeal he had for her. Her trembling quieted some more. His right hand held her legs, but his left was under her back, and he pulled her tight. Her perfume smelled stronger, more inviting this close up and mixed in with the intoxicating smell of her hair. Everything about her had excited him. He stroked her skin through the fabric of her clothes and felt a tremble move through her.

“I’ve never saved a lady like this before,” he said. “Are you all right?”

Her breath deepened and she lifted her head from his shoulder. A wave of heat swept through him as he gazed into the most beautiful eyes he’d ever seen. Perfectly formed, wide-open brown eyes locked with his gaze. He looked over her whole face from her thick, lush hair; past her eyes and over the curves of her cheeks; to end on her full lips. An urge surged into him to lean his head down and take her lips into his. He wanted to taste her, but he resisted. He wanted her, but she had run from something. If he went in for a quick kiss, his chances would be over. He needed to reassure her of her safety and avoid scaring her. He breathed in and lifted his eyes to meet her gaze again.

Her mascara had smudged, but she wasn’t crying. Whatever tears she had were over as her body continued a slow descent from fear to calm. “What happened to the gator?” she blurted out, her eyes darting to look at the path behind them.

His face contorted for a moment. Then he broke into a deep, rich laugh that rumbled through her body and heated her up. He held her close to him and she briefly wondered why she hadn’t jumped out of his arms yet. Here was a real man. Not the fake, made-up one she left behind in New York. Warmth flowed down between her legs, a place she thought she’d turned off for the time being, since learning the truth about Gary. But the arousal growing between her legs pulsed steady.

“I didn’t see any gators back there,” he said. “But I did go past a…, well it’s better to be safe then to stick around and find out there is a gator hanging about.”

His thumb gently stroked her back and she suppressed an urge to sink back into his shoulder. He was making her feel good. Too good. Plus he’s obviously seen something and decided not to embarrass her with it. If he told her that she had run away screaming from a chipmunk, she’d have hopped from his arms and gone full business-only on him. Either politeness came naturally to him, or he held back to flatter her and make a score. It bothered her that the latter was more likely and she didn’t care.

“I’m glad I moved quick enough to catch you. It’d been a nasty fall if I hadn’t,” he said, then he stepped back to kick some protruding tree branches in the ground.

She made a quick look down and winced. Tree branches stuck up from the ground at awkward angles. If she had hit one, it could have broken her back. At the very least, he saved her from some major bruising. She considered the difficulties in getting any type of ambulance to this location, and one hand around his neck started weaving her fingers into his hair. He tensed and relaxed, and then she realized what she was doing and pulled her hands away from his neck until they rested between her chest and his.

“Is your name Erica?” he asked.

She nodded her head and marveled how he made the simple act of asking her name sound sexy. The rise and fall of his chest moved against her breasts, hardening her nipples. Her breasts sensitivity increased with each exhale, and she knew that if she didn’t get away from him, she’d do something she’d regret in the morning. This man, whatever drug he was, tempted her like no other.

She pushed her hands against his chest in a signal to let her go. The beat of his heart felt good through his shirt and a tremble tore through her. “You should probably put me down. I must be heavy,” she said. She didn’t believe a word of it. Except for the moment when he caught her, he hadn’t so much as flinched under the task of holding her weight. Gary and any other man she had ever been with would have collapsed by now under the strain, but she could sense the strength in his arms.

He adjusted his hold on her slightly. His muscles tensed and flexed underneath her as he dipped her feet toward the ground and gently let her down. She leaned back into his grip as her feet found their footing. Her body craved every second of his touch. His hand slid from her leg to her back before he took it off her. However rough he seemed, she noted that he didn’t take the opportunity to get a quick squeeze of her ass when his hand passed over. Another man might have copped a feel, but he had treated her with respect, and it impressed her.

She needed to gain control of herself around him before she started asking him if he had a girlfriend or was married. Her time with him meant work. A job needed to be done and that didn’t include romance. Besides what would any man, with such intense sex appeal, want with a girl like her? Local women probably beat their way to his door for dates.

Why wouldn’t they? She knew from his ability to catch and hold her that he was built. But now that she could look at him face to face, she realized how much she underestimated him. His rugged face could go on any ad and have the women fawning. The muscles in his corded arms and legs matched any Olympian. Only the dirt on his shirt seemed out of place.

Then she looked down at herself. “My new clothes,” she gasped. Dirt, sap, and moss stained her outfit. She held up her hands and saw the same.

Her checks flushed. “I’m so sorry. This has never happened before. I got your clothes messy.” She tried to brush some of the dirt off his shirt and wondered if she intended to help him get cleaner or if she just wanted to touch him again.

He laughed deeper this time and the bass rumbled around in her chest. She heated up again when he took her hands in his. “It’s nothing to worry about. But your clothes are going to need more cleaning than mine are anyway.”

He let her hands go. “I’m not sure how we’re going to shoot any video until we get you something else to wear,” he said.

She looked over the mess she made of herself again. Wearing the drab clothes she brought with her was out of the question. She wanted to make a statement with her wardrobe in this report and had no intention of changing her mind about it.

“Do you have anything else to wear in your car?” he asked.

Going back to her hotel or a store would take time, but she didn’t see what alternative she had. “No,” she said and made her decision. “I’m sorry again, but I’m going to have to head back to the city to get something more to wear. Will we still have time to do this today or do we need to reschedule?” she asked. Plus, the faster she got away from him, the less likely she would act on the naughty images racing through her head.

Chapter 4

She excited him even more, face to face, than when he saw her running. The bayou had put her in a new environment, and momentarily frightened her, but an unmistakable core of strength had shown clearly through her eyes. She took his breath away, and all the talk of needing to change tested his will. He wanted to be the one to help her out of her dirty clothes and into… nothing. Every impulse in his body screamed for him to simply throw her down on the path and take her there.

He resisted. Something about Erica told him that she wasn’t like the typical big-city girls he’d met in the past. Usually he bumped into them when they came down for Mardi Gras, and invariably, they were three drinks past being ready for any man to take them where they stood. He avoided every woman like that. If a woman was willing to have any man, then he had no interest in them.