“But you didn’t know the man before this?” Connor asked, poking at his blackened fish, his gaze still zeroed in on Kat.
Maya knew what he was inferring. How could Kat have trusted a virtual stranger with her life? But Maya also read between the lines. As determined as Kat had been to find Connor, Maya knew more was going on between them than Connor was willing to admit.
“I investigated Wade as thoroughly as I could. I discovered that when he wasn’t in the Amazon searching for lost treasure, he was a respectable businessman in Pensacola, Florida—a computer programmer during the day and a game-design hobbyist at night. He was on Facebook, LinkedIn, Myspace, Twitter, and a number of other networking sites.”
Connor was frowning.
Kat ignored his obvious annoyance. “I had posted about doing a feature on the new jaguar cubs at my local zoo and was searching for any information about a Connor Anderson and his jaguar who vacationed in the Amazon when Wade told me he knew of you—not personally, but he had seen you around.”
“Around,” Connor said skeptically.
Kat folded her arms and said to Connor, “Wade asked if I wanted to meet up with him when he visited the rain forest and said he would take me to where you stayed. I did check him out. I found a number of pictures of him—some when he was wearing a suit, some in his jungle khaki attire. They all revealed a friendly sort who liked adventure. I admit I admired his enthusiasm for the unusual and the way he seemed grounded in a real job, too.”
“Like you?” Connor asked.
“Yeah. But everything began to unravel when he didn’t meet me at the café at the appointed time.”
Connor shook his head. “I don’t know this Wade Patterson.”
Maya could tell her brother didn’t like that Patterson had known anything about them or their connection to jaguars. But the inflection in Connor’s voice and his expression revealed more. He didn’t like that Kat had been meeting with this man alone.
“Are you finished eating?” Connor asked, sounding annoyed.
Kat nodded.
“Was there any other reason you came here?” Connor pried.
“What do you mean?” Kat responded, sounding defensive.
Connor rose from his chair, looking more like a grizzly than a jaguar, and closed in on Kat like the predator he was. He lifted her into his arms, pressing her close to his body in a posture that was all too telling that she was his and no one else’s, and carried her back to his bed.
“Wait,” she said, clinging to him, “I want to brush my teeth.”
He turned around, headed for the washbasin, and set her on her feet. Then she retrieved a toothbrush and toothpaste from her backpack. After she brushed and brushed and brushed, she finally relinquished the toothbrush and toothpaste, and he carried her back to the bed.
“I believe,” he said quietly to Kat, although Maya could hear because of their highly attuned cat hearing, “there’s more to your coming here than you’re letting on.”
Maya could have kicked him when he acted so intimidating toward Kat, but to Kat’s credit, she didn’t back down from him. Once he set Kat on the bed, their gazes collided and locked as if ready for battle. Maya heard their accelerated heartbeats and hoped this was only a bit of getting to know you better and not that they really didn’t like each other at all.
“Like you were nearly killed here a year ago. Like you were having nightmares. Like you might still be on a mission,” Connor accused.
Maya wanted her brother to back off, but she wanted to know Kat’s motives, too. With her back stiff, her nerves on edge, and her lips clamped tight, Maya cleared the dishes and listened.
Kat lifted her chin and looked Connor straight in the eye. “My mission was to personally thank you for saving my life.”
“And?” he pressured.
She pressed her lips together, then took a deep breath and said, “Yes, I have nightmares still. Sometimes facing your fear can help to put it in proper perspective.”
“You’re not on a military mission, then?”
“No,” she said, sounding irritated, but whether with Connor or the Army, or both, Maya couldn’t tell.
“She’s too weak to move anywhere,” Maya warned, trying to get them off this other business. She wanted them to get along, not be annoyed with each other. But most of all, she didn’t want her brother thinking it was okay now to dump Kat off at a resort.
Both Kat and Connor glanced at her as if they’d forgotten she was there.
“A couple of days, Maya,” he said, giving her a dark look. “Then we’ll see.”
Maya could tell her brother didn’t trust her where Kat was concerned. Maya prayed that she had already done the deed of turning Kat and that Connor wouldn’t be able to stop the process. And that he wouldn’t be too angry with her.
She glanced at Kat. And that she wouldn’t be, either.
Chapter 7
After eating, Kat was feeling much better, relatively speaking. At least her head was no longer filled with fog, and she could remember what everyone asked her. Connor was cleaning the burned frying pan while Maya worked on the plastic dishes and asked her all kinds of questions.
Kat had been amused that Maya had questioned her about whether she had a boyfriend. Connor hadn’t touched the subject. But he’d listened to every word she’d spoken, watched her every move, and if she didn’t know better, she’d think he was listening to the inflection in her voice, trying to determine her hidden agenda. She didn’t have one!
She sighed. She didn’t owe either Maya or Connor an explanation about her personal life, but Maya was becoming a fast friend. And although she never had anyone to use as a sounding board before, she wanted to talk about her ex-fiancé for some reason.
“I was engaged,” she said, watching the two of them for a reaction.
Connor’s scrub brush stopped in midair, and Maya’s hand stilled on the dish she was wiping off.
“Oh?” Maya said, her tone encouraging.
Kat was fairly certain Connor was dying to know the details, too, but he was trying hard not to show it. He had gone back to scrubbing the pan, but much less vigorously than before.
“Roger was a major in the Army, working on the same mission behind the scenes.”
She was surprised when Connor gave her an incredulous look, and then his expression became one of condemnation. “Behind the scenes,” he growled, not hiding his annoyance at the way her ex had treated her.
“It was the mission. What wasn’t part of the plan was that my men would all die and I would be so severely wounded.”
The muscle in Connor’s jaw ticked as he studied her. He looked like a thunderstorm building in the jungle—sudden, dark, and dangerous.
“Roger couldn’t cope with the prospect of having a future wife who was that unstable.”
“Unstable,” Connor said, raising a brow.
“Nope, not good for any kids that we might have someday had. I don’t blame him. Well, maybe a little bit. If he had been shell-shocked during a mission, I would have stuck it out with him. Through sickness and health.”
Connor looked her over with the predatory appearance of a feral animal, as if he wanted to take her for his own.
He was gorgeous and sexy, his body rippling with muscles every time he moved since he wore no shirt again. A pair of light-colored khaki pants and boots were all that he had on for now. His skin was a tawny golden color and his hair just as golden, like Maya’s. And both had the most beautiful amber eyes that appeared as though they could look into her soul, read her every intention, and understand her to the marrow of her bones.