24. Chapter 21 – Maddox #3
“They are not like mosquitoes,” she retorted from behind me.
I smiled at her vehemence, amused my powerful leader could be taken out by a tame leaf-eater. The remains of a small camp just beyond my feet halted my amusement.
Ferns had been pressed flat in a perfect rectangle, as if something had laid on top of it—a tarp? An oblong circle had been dug into the earth. It was filled with coals, and the light scent of charcoal still lingered—evidence of man. The camp had been abandoned, but within the last day.
“Fuck.”
Marley’s shouted curse carried through the trees, forcing a squawk from a toucan above.
Cautiously, I scanned the perimeter, searching for footprints or more blood to lead us forward.
Something metal caught my eye, almost fully hidden beneath the cover of thorny bush.
Reaching for it, I grasped the cool cylinder between my fingers and pulled it up to get a better look.
“Purdue” read the label of the travel mug. I’d never seen one before until everyone on the plane carried one in the same way we carried our own weapons in prison.
Smuggled cellphones and limited access to television over the years had exposed me to the new world outside my walls, but many things I did not understand. Prison life was far simpler.
“That’s mine,” Marley gasped. I turned and held it up between us. “I had that in the cockpit—it’s where I did my training—I’ve had that for years.”
I handed it to her, and she turned it over and over in her palms like a magic lamp that held her answers. The thick air that hung over us didn’t need words to fill it. He’d been here, and he’d left, the container our only clue.
“Jamie?” she called, her voice tentative and calm, before escalating to a manic high-pitched screech. “Jamie?!” She frantically searched through the ferns and low bushes, her fear of snakes dormant as she scoured this small pocket of rainforest for clues.
I followed her lead, lifting thick vines and surveying the perimeter of this small camp. I lifted a large, leafy branch with small orange flowers, only to find the abandoned translucent husk of a much larger snake than the one we’d seen at the base of its roots.
Much larger. As thick as my thigh and several feet long. Slowly lowering the leaves to not draw any attention, I moved on to look under the smaller ferns, finding nothing.
My captain looked upward at the carpeted canopy, as if her friend might be hanging in the tree branches with the monkeys and the bush-eaters.
“Jamie?” she yelled up the hidden sky, scattering smaller birds from the towering limbs.
“God dammit,” she cursed, running her hands through her hair in frustration.
Tiny dew drops sat beneath her eyes. I glared at them, my anger building at seeing my captain in pain.
The jungle foliage was getting heavier, the overhanging vines impossible to get through without cutting them down. There was nothing else to be found—a dead end.
“Perhaps he’d retraced his steps back to the river. Come.” Grasping her hand in a tight grip, I tugged her to follow me back to where we’d come from. “We will find nothing else today. Not here.”
She complied, stunned into a stupor. Once we reached the small ledge to the riverbed, I leaped down the four feet and held my arms open to catch her, beckoning her to jump.
She landed between my biceps in a soft thump, her brows heavy with worry. I held her tightly to my chest, inhaling the scent of her hair and the soft musk of her sweat.
“We will find him, ángel. Perhaps not today, but he has not gone far.” I released her to the ground, brushing my hands up her ribs as she dropped.
She shivered at the contact, but her troubled eyes struggled to meet mine.
She rolled the bottle between her fingers, anxious energy clanking against the steel hull.
She needed a diversion to bring temporary peace. I could give her that.
“We are still in need of fruit,” I commanded, wrapping one arm around her shoulders to steer her back toward the plane. “Show me where the best trees are.”
Wide green eyes glanced up at me in surprise, as if remembering her secondary mission.
Seduction. Her sexy body for my stolen gun. Would she go through with it as her conversation with Nikki had promised, or had the camp sighting changed her intentions?
My heart held hope, and my cock twitched to attention when she licked her lips nervously. Her concerned frown molded into a pained smile, as if her muscles had frozen between a smirk and a wink.
I did nothing, said nothing as she contemplated her direction.
If she wanted to go through with this, she needed to make the first move.
A crimson flush bloomed across her neck and cheeks in the silence as a different, charged energy rolled between us.
The mask of a killer remained in place, but behind it, I fought the urge to grin. How adorable my competent pilot was.
I hoped she blushed this hard when I made her come.
She held up a palm and tentatively rubbed it down my chest, petting me in stilted pats like I was a Rottweiler puppy. My cock thickened further, enjoying the simple touch of a woman.
Not just any woman. Her.
“Let’s get some fruit,” she said, securing my compliance to her every desire. Her patting grew into long rubs down my torso, shuffling awkwardly to get closer to me.
This woman was as sexy as Ana Patricia, the real-life version of my wettest dream. But she flirted like Big Bird.
She snuggled into my side, dragging one of her bountiful, heavy breasts along my ribs. Rising on her tiptoes, she dragged her hot breath along my ear, chilling my skin in its wake. I shivered at her touch, the longing in my body ready to give her anything she requested.
Her hand stopped at my waistband, hovering just above the button. I stood deathly still in anticipation, a canvas waiting for paint. The lips I’d spend a life in prison waiting to kiss opened against my ear and whispered the words that would become my final downfall.
“But first, why don’t you give me a taste of your banana?”
I’d withstood torture, solitary confinement, drugging, and attempted murder, and in every instance, kept my composure. The laugh that erupted from my chest could not be contained—the chuckles bouncing above our heads in disruptive snorts.
My captain was not Big Bird at all. I was instead enamored by Curious George.