Free On Thin Ice by Anne Stuart

she saw was him, a child she’d known from infancy. He died too quickly.” Her voice was cold and bitter, and she drew her legs up, pressing her face against her knees.
    He could thank her for that, but he wasn’t in the mood to be grateful. The sun had set, the temperature dropping, and his wet clothes were cold and clammy against his skin. “And what the hell were you doing, wandering around in the jungle like that? I told you to stay put. They could have killed you if I hadn’t gotten to you first.”
    Faint color stained her pale face. “I was trying to warn you.”
    “What?”
    “I said I was trying to warn you. I saw them coming and I thought the waterfall would be too loud for you to hear them, and I was trying to find you.”
    He stared at her in amazement, not sure what to say. “I hate to tell you this, darlin’ one, but I can save my own life. Next time stay put and wait for me to come for you. I’m not one of your orphans to be rescued.” The color on her face darkened, and he felt a moment’s regret. He pushed it away. “I’m going to need to climb back up and see if I can find Dylan. He’s a pain in the butt but he’s worth too much to leave behind. Unless you have any objections.”
    “Of course not,” she said. He had to give her credit – she was terrified of the idea of being left alone, but she didn’t say a word. “You can’t leave a teenage boy out alone in the wilderness.”
    “He’s older than your friend Carlos.”
    “Don’t!” She shuddered, casting an uneasy glance toward the water. The body had sunk beneath the surface, and she wouldn’t have had a good look at the damage the forty-five caliber bullet had done. She put her face back down on her knees. “Go ahead,” she said weakly. “I’ll be right here.”
    He couldn’t afford to show her any mercy. He started back, surveying the cliff he was more than likely going to have to scale, then paused, spun around and hauled her to her feet. She looked up at him, her big eyes wide and unnervingly calm in her pale face. Without a word he hauled her toward the underbrush, and for a moment she began to fight him. He caught her flailing arms in one hard grip, pulling her back against him as he dragged her further into the undergrowth. He released her, and she went sprawling on the ground.
    “Stay put,” he said in a flat voice. “If you even know the meaning of the term. I’ll come back for you, but if you make the stupid mistake of following me again I’ll let you die.”
    It took him a moment to recognize the look of panic that faded into surprise and then into nothing at all, and he managed a mirthless laugh. “No, sweetheart, I’m not going to rape you. I’ve got more important things on my mind right now. Mainly staying alive. You’re a choice piece of ass but I value my skin a little more highly than a quick fuck in the undergrowth. Now stay put or I might change my mind.” He wouldn’t, of course. He’d been in too many war zones, seen the horrors of rape at close hand, and it disgusted him. But nothing else seemed to scare her into obeying him, and he wasn’t beyond fighting dirty.
    He turned his back on her before he could change his mind. It wouldn’t take much to convince himself he had to kiss her to scare her into not moving, had to feel those hard nipples against his hands, push his body against her. He was cold and wet and bad-tempered and he was getting a hard-on anyway, which annoyed him as much as her big innocent eyes. He hated women who screamed and cried, yet for some reason Beth Pennington’s measured calm drove him crazy.
    A moment later he was gone, the jungle closing around him, as the sun set behind the jagged peaks of the Andes.
     
     
    Beth shivered. He was bluffing, she knew it. He wasn’t going to rape her, even if she’d felt a moment’s panic when he’d started dragging her into the bushes. It had been a knee-jerk reaction on her part, and she should have known better. She