Chapter 6
OLIVIA
I wasn’t sure I wanted to risk another encounter with Giovanni’s wandering hands, but I let petty revenge get the better of me when I saw Nathan about to climb into the Land Cruiser.
His annoying comment about not coming along echoed in my ears.
The rejection last night had pissed me off, so I wanted to repay the feeling.
We drove for a long while, and tension eased as I took in the African landscape.
God, it was beautiful. Cape buffalo grazed in the rolling hills near a watering hole where zebras drank.
My reasons for coming on the drive were childish, but I was glad I’d made the decision.
Even as the man behind me radiated disapproval.
The sun was low when the Land Cruiser crawled toward a gray mass of animal, nibbling on the grass.
Phillip’s voice was hushed, but I got the feeling it was out of respect and not necessity.
“This is a white rhino. Young, male. He left his mother not long ago. I remember him wandering off from her and her following. Mom had a tough time letting go.” The South African pulled out a sophisticated camera with a long lens.
“The light is best right now, and he’s a great looking fellow. ”
“Are they your favorite? Rhinos?” I asked.
“They’re magnificent creatures, and if things continue, they won’t be around much longer.”
My focus lingered on the enormous animal whose foraging brought it slowly closer to us.
“There’s a saying,” the South African continued, “that the only good poacher is a dead one, and when I look at this fellow here . . . it’s hard to disagree.”
I could understand his disgust. He’d spent his life around these animals, and his livelihood depended on them.
For a long time, we sat in silence and watched the rhino graze.
Giovanni finally had his rhino and appeared transfixed by the lumbering animal. It reminded me of a cow in a strangely sweet way. It was serene, peaceful. I wasn’t one to get sentimental or melodramatic, but for the first time in a long while, I felt okay.
But things were not okay.
Nathan put one of his long legs over the seatback and then the other, sliding down so he was now seated between me and Giovanni, and leaned forward.
“Phillip,” his voice was almost inaudible, “what other languages do you speak?”
“French and some Spanish—”
The quiet and hurried French that spilled from Nathan’s mouth made Phillip’s face fill with shock.
“What is it?” I asked, matching Nathan’s quiet tone. His face gave nothing away, but something was clearly wrong, and my heart beat wildly. He was speaking in French specifically so I wouldn’t understand.
What was he saying that made the South African so nervous?
That was when Giovanni reached for the rifle on the dashboard.
Oh, no.
During the van ride to the lodge, I’d heard Nathan translate that Giovanni hadn’t purchased any hunting permits. It was because you couldn’t get permits for what Giovanni wanted to hunt.
He was going to shoot the rhino calf. My heart seized as the barrel of the rifle swung toward the gray, moving mountain where an oxpecker bird hitched a ride.
Nathan and Phillip were utterly still as Giovanni prepared to fire, but there was no way I was going to let that happen, even with the intimidating American man seated beside me.
I was so focused on what I was about to do, the movement in the bushes didn’t register until I reached out and knocked the barrel up to the sky. Either he was a second before firing or my action startled him enough to pull the trigger, because the long gun went off with a tremendous retort.
The rhino snorted, turned, and galloped the opposite direction from the vehicle, crashed through the brush and disappeared. All three men spoke at once in their native languages—upset or concerned, I couldn’t tell.
“Rounds!” Nathan demanded, causing Phillip to fumble with the glove box for more ammo. Meanwhile, he grasped the zipper of his jacket and yanked it down so he’d have access to his gun.
All the air drained from my lungs.
What had I done? Giovanni hadn’t been intending to shoot the rhino—he’d been aiming at the pair of poachers who’d been moving in on foot. Everyone in the vehicle had been so quiet and still, and the tall grass and brush had made us difficult to notice.
I’d forced Giovanni to shoot into the air and give away our position.
The two men, lean and dark, focused their attention and guns on our vehicle. That was the last thing I saw before Nathan curled a rough hand around the back of my neck and shoved my head into his lap. Then he retrieved the gun holstered inside his open jacket.
A shot whizzed overhead, slicing through a branch. Two more cracks ripped from a gun and hit the side of my door as leaves from above rained down.
I had to be impressed with Giovanni, who reloaded with lightning speed and fired again. There was a sharp noise of pain from just beyond the car and then hurried footsteps and branches rustled as one of them fled.
As that faded, there were strangled sounds of gurgling from nearby.
Oh, God. Giovanni had hit the man . . . but not killed him.
His Italian words were cold and calm, but I felt the jolt go through the body beneath my hands. Nathan was reluctant to do whatever he’d just been asked to. He drew in a heavy breath and placed his left hand on my shoulder, either to steady himself or prevent me from sitting up.
He lifted his gun and fired a single shot, silencing the gurgling.
My whole body shook when he put his weapon away and zipped his fleece closed. His hands were steady, sure. There was no physical reaction from him. You’d never know he’d just taken another man’s life, even if it had been to end his suffering.
My hands ached because I was gripping his thigh ferociously. It had to hurt, but he didn’t ask me to release him.
“What are we going to do about that?” he said.
“Hyena will take care of it,” Phillip answered. “Tomorrow there will be hardly anything left.”
Nathan’s hand hesitantly came to rest on my shoulder, and this time I flinched at his touch. Giovanni babbled, and it seemed to annoy his bodyguard.
“Enough, I get it,” he snapped at his boss. Then his voice softened. “Olivia, it’s safe now. If you want to sit up, keep your eyes on me.”
I exhaled loudly. I wasn’t sure whether I’d prefer to look at the dead body instead of Nathan’s cold eyes.
The engine of the Land Cruiser rumbled to a start and rolled in reverse toward the sandy path, and I sat up in time to see Phillip spit on the ground.
I got the sense that it wasn’t so much the execution that had left a bad taste in his mouth.
It seemed like this was a final sign of disrespect to the poacher.
Nathan’s eyes weren’t cold. They were filled with chaos, and I didn’t understand. At least he wasn’t angry. If anything, he looked worried.
“Are you all right?” he whispered.
“I almost got us killed.” The adrenaline pumping through my veins made me unable to control my mouth. “I thought Giovanni was going to shoot the rhino. That’s why I went for the rifle.”
Upon hearing his name, the Italian asked something, perhaps to translate, which he did.
“No, no,” Giovanni said, followed by more Italian. But I was too overwhelmed to listen to the translation. The landscape whizzed by. I didn’t know how I felt about what had just happened. Like last time I’d witnessed death, I was completely numb.
“Olivia.” Nathan jarred me out of the fog. He must have asked me something, but I couldn’t fathom what it was. “He wants you to know he’s not angry.”
“Great.” Like I cared what Giovanni thought. This was why he’d come to South Africa, why he wanted to seek out the rhinoceros. Here, you could actively hunt another human. It was legal, and all but encouraged. My stomach filled with bile, and the revulsion toward him was acute.
Nathan had taken the final shot, but he’d done so reluctantly.
Giovanni had hungered for the kill and didn’t have the balls or the decency to finish it himself.
“What’s he saying now?” I demanded.
Nathan’s expression didn’t change. “That you’ll join him for dinner.”