Shadow Play (23 page)

"Morgan, I want you to listen to me very carefully," came Henry's calm words. "Think of something pleasant. Conjure up the most beautiful image you can, and don't deviate from it for a moment. Can you do that?"

Morgan turned his eyes to Sarah. He expected pity, per- haps revulsion at his pus-enlarged features. He anticipated tears or hysteria. No doubt she would swoon, or vomit; at the very least she would stumble away with words of apology pouring from her lovely lips. He did not imagine that she would take up his good hand and hold it pressed against her breast. As she smiled down at him, her face reflecting the glow of the firelight, he was taken by surprise, and awash in an admiration and gratitude he had rarely felt for another human being.

"Morgan, it will be necessary for me to lance your swellings in several places."

Sarah gripped him more tightly. Her smile seemed a little less stolid, more pinched and slightly watery. Still, she clutched him to her as if it were
his
presence giving
her
strength instead of the other way around.

He focused on her face as the first incision was made.

Somewhere beyond the wall of fire and pain he heard Kan singing.

He gritted his teeth, feeling his body jerk involuntarily.

He tried his best not to clench her hand too hard. He might hurt her, God forbid. She was so fragile.

The inferno inside him blazed anew and the pain roared like the
Pororoca
up his throat.

He tried not to thrash his head.

His body twisted and light exploded inside his brain.

Someone called out for Sarah.

Someone was screaming for Sarah.

Then the darkness dragged him down into a pit of nothingness, and deep, deep in the blackness, someone was chanting.

Sarah refused to leave Morgan while he slept. She bathed his feverish skin with water and occasionally took up a fern leaf and fanned him, hoping the cool air would comfort him. The moon was nearing its peak before she gently placed Morgan's hand across his stomach and turned to the others.

The night was an array of jet-black shadows and vivid orange light from the campfire. Kan, who had entered a narcotic trance upon drinking the tea and proceeded to ritualistically suck the infection from Morgan's body and spit it out into the night, now lay in an exhausted heap on the church steps. The others gazed into the flames, dark faces lined with concern.

Henry left his place on the church steps and hurried to meet her. "Are you all right?" he asked.

"I'm very tired."

"I've rigged you up a bed inside. Thought you might appreciate the privacy for a change. I don't know if it'll help the mosquito situation, but..."

She turned away and started up the steps. She heard Henry pad up behind her and hesitate at the door before following her in. A hammock hung from the church rafters, the mosquito netting a shroud draped around it. With little effort she rolled into the bed, and Henry hurried to close the netting, gently tucking the ends around her to keep it in place. She gazed at him for a long moment before she could find the will to speak.

"Will he die?" she asked.

"Morgan? Die? He's the
boto,
remember?"

"Will he die?"

"Of course not. I won't let him. He is my only friend in the world. Remember?"

She pressed her open palm against the netting. He placed his hand upon hers. "Promise me," she pleaded.

"The poultice will draw out the poison and the swelling will go down. But that may take a while. If all else fails, we'll let the chief have another go. The old boy seemed to know

what he was about." He released a heavy sigh. "Get some sleep. The last days have been hell on us all, Sarah. Good night, my dear.''

He turned and walked to the mission's doorway, where he stopped and looked back. His figure was black against the dim light of the distant fire.

"Call me if there's any change," she told him.

"I will. Now go to sleep, Sarah."

He remained where he stood for some time, as if to assure her that all was fine. Then he slipped away without a sound.

The night closed in around her as she rolled onto her side and gazed up at the darkened stained glass, and at the Virgin Mary whose kind face was aglow with moonlight. At some time during the past hours, or days, the seed of doubt and regret had germinated inside her, turning her priorities and resolve upside down. Dear Lord, they were as unprotected and unprepared as infants cast into the harsh world to fend for themselves. They were as weak and vulnerable as new- born lambs against a pack of starving wolves. They had stepped from the very heart of civilization, where man's only enemy was himself, into a world teeming with a danger that was often invisible to the naked eye. Death was real.

And waiting, hidden behind
every leaf
and rock and ripple of water. How swiftly and unexpectedly it had loomed up to strike them. The same thing could happen tomorrow. Or tonight.

Shuddering, she allowed her eyes to search out each dark corner of the church. The mosquito netting fluttered as a breeze blew through the unshuttered windows. There was an unfamiliar rattling somewhere near, and her heart pounded with visions of savages or animals skulking up from the forest to attack them the moment they let down their guard. Then, much to her relief, she realized it was the rustling of leaves in the wind.

Closing her eyes, she attempted to focus her mind on pleasant thoughts of England, her fiance and her future as Lady Sheffield. How ironic that now, as she lay sweltering in this godforsaken jungle trying to visualize her fiancees face, she could not do it. The only images that came to mind were those of steel-gray eyes and intensely sensual lips. Of hands that made her flesh burn as hotly as the equatorial sun when they brushed her. Which wasn't often. Not nearly as often as she would have liked.

Morgan had a way of looking at a woman that made her feel desirable. Not just pretty, but heart-stopping beautiful. As if she were the only woman left alive on the face of the planet. The idea made her smile. She imagined he wouldn't be so standoffish then. More likely, he'd take her in his arms, as he had that night in the rain. Just thinking about it now made the blood move in a molten flow through her veins, her breath catch, and her heart pound in her throat.

In her grief she had promised herself that if she ever saw Morgan again, she would put her feelings for Norman aside long enough to examine the emotions the American evoked in her. She had almost, but not quite, come to the startling conclusion that, with very little effort—and if she weren't very careful—she could love him.

Wearily, she rolled off her bed and walked to the mission door. Henry stood at Morgan's side, one arm slid under his head as he tried to get Morgan to drink from a cup. "Please," Henry begged. "Take just a little. If not for yourself, then for me, or Sarah. We need you, Morgan. We won't let you die."

Sarah closed her eyes and rested her head against the wall. Oh, yes, she could love him, and everything he rep- resented. He stood for freedom from the kind of convention she had secretly found so tedious during her stay in England. His very presence brought a liberation of the human spirit. He made her feel alive—so
very
much alive for the first time in her life.

What, dear God, was she going to do?

Morgan's recovery was nothing short of miraculous. Within three days the poultice Henry had concocted had drawn out the ants' poison and his body's infection. The swelling had disappeared completely. There was little to attest to his excruciating and frightening ordeal as he occasionally left his bed to bathe or do odd jobs around camp, gradually building up his strength.

On the morning of the fourth day, Sarah arose and ventured down to the stream behind the mission, eager to sponge the sweat and grit from her body. Henry and Morgan had assured her that there were no piranhas or candirus swarming in its depths, but there were the trees that must be forged before reaching the stream, and God only knew what was lurking in them.

Still, the day was coming when Morgan would be strong enough to travel, and although she and Henry had mentioned that they would be more than happy to forget this perilous venture and return home, Morgan had been adamant about continuing. She would be forced to confront the jungle eventually. Now seemed as good a time as any.

She gathered up her soap, brush, a clean pair of stockings, tucked them all in her shirt, and left the church. Neither Morgan nor Henry nor Kan was about. She went on to the stream, which had a swimming hole, stripped herself of her clothes, and waded into the shoulder-deep water.

It was glorious! Closing her eyes, she turned her face up to the sun and tried to recall when anything had felt so luxurious. She scrubbed her hair and skin with the soap until she felt radiant, and was about to leave the water to dress when the sound of voices stopped her. She looked one way, then the other. Nothing. Perhaps she was imagining things, but to be safe she decided to dress quickly and return to camp. She'd dawdled too long as it was and—

There came the sound of furiously rattling bushes-—suddenly a tree limb collapsed,

spilling Morgan and Henry, yelling, into the water. Sarah screamed and stumbled back, so startled she forgot her nude state until both men surfaced, sputtering and wheezing, their eyes glued on her anatomy as she glared back at them. "My God, you frightened me out of my wits!" she cried.

Water streaming down his face, his black hair in his eyes, Morgan glanced at a rapidly paddling Henry and yanked him up by his arm. "Sorry," they replied in unison.

"What were you doing up there?"

"We heard someone coming," Henry began.

"It seemed the most logical place to hide," Morgan finished.

"Then you've been hiding up there the entire..."

They nodded. She realized in that instant just what it was they were gaping at. As nonchalantly as possible, she covered her breasts with her arms and turned her back to them, her cheeks aflame with embarrassment. "If you don't mind, I'd like to get dressed."

"I don't mind," came Morgan's voice. "Do you, Henry?"

"Absolutely not. Go ahead, my dear, we won't interfere."

"Alone!" she stressed.

"Oh!"

"Oh, well, in that case..."

She heard mumbled complaints and a great deal of splashing. "I told you that limb wasn't strong enough, but you insisted."

"By Jove, but this is most embarrassing."

After a moment she heard the rustling of bushes, then silence again. Yet she sensed she wasn't alone. She looked back over one white shoulder. There stood Morgan, leaning against a tree, his wet clothes clinging to his body, his arms crossed over his chest as he watched her. Her heart danced as she gazed at his ruggedly handsome features. "Well?" she asked. "What are you waiting for? Haven't you humiliated me enough for one day?"

"You don't look very humiliated."

"Oh? How do I look?"

"Wet. And naked. And damned tempting."

She shook her head and her drying hair spilled riotously around her flushed face.

"Like Eve must have looked in the Garden of Eden," Morgan continued.

"Why, Mr. Kane, if I didn't know you better, I'd think you were a romantic."

"And if I didn't know you better, I might imagine that you're waiting for me to wade into that water and make love to you."

"I can hardly remove myself when you're watching."

"I'm no threat to you, Sarah. Not as long as you're in love with another man."

She frowned.

"You
are
in love with Norman... aren't you?"

A moment of frightening indecision passed as she stared blindly over the rippling water

and tried to come to grips with her feelings. She had asked herself the same

question these past days. Now the man who had caused all her doubts was demanding an

answer.

" Sarah?" came his voice behind her, but now much closer. Her breath caught as he laid his hand on her shoulder. "Sarah, you haven't answered me."

"Please." The word trembled. "I can't."

“Don't you know? You either love the man or you don't. "

She spun around with the intent of castigating him, but the ,words died on her lips. She became breathless as the water lapped at his hips, beaded his lush hair, and glittered on his shoulders. She watched his eyes change from silver fire to steely gray, and she felt mesmerized, shaken by an awakening that was too terrifying to be ignored, yet too dangerous to be acknowledged.

His hands slid along her throat to her face, gliding over and into her coiling hair, and with a moan of despair she knew she could no longer run from the need he aroused in her. She could no longer hide behind her feelings for another when her body burned with a desire she had never felt for Norman. Then one masculine hand was cupping her face tenderly, and she was drifting like a petal on the water into his solid body, unwittingly molding her wet flesh against his as she turned up her face for his kiss.

His warm lips brushed the sensitive corners of her aching mouth, a fleeting touch that burned as sharply as a spark that burst into fire the moment he pulled her nearer, so near her body could detect the shocking hardness of his masculinity within his pants. The blood began to pound in her throat when his thumb drifted over her cheekbone, explored the crescent of her lashes as she closed her eyes. These feelings were new, so new, but everything she had dreamed of feeling--delirious, glorious, burning, aching.

"What will it take," came his lazy voice in her ear, "to make you want me?
Chere,
tell

me. You want tenderness?" His fingers swept down her spine with a masseur's caress. "I can be tender."

He placed his broad palm upon her buttock, lifted her so she was floating in his hand, suspended, and vaguely she realized he was coaxing open her legs in a deliciously wicked way and wrapping them around his thighs, which pressed intimately against her. A new swirl of responses flared inside her. Turbulent. Pulsing. Thick and fluid. Fusing deep in the feminine heart of her.

"Do you shiver that way when he touches you here?" He moved away and the suction of their bodies parting sounded disarming and naughty. Her nervousness made her giddy. She wanted to laugh and cry all at once. She felt as if she were caught in some erotic fairy tale where all her secret fantasies would at last come true.