Beyond caring if she woke someone, Kelly dove toward the nearest opening, half falling through the flap, seeking immediate shelter.
The room was dark. Lightning burst, shining brightly through a smaller back door to the chamber. The lone hammock in the room was thankfully empty. She stumbled gratefully toward it.
As she crossed toward the hammock, her feet tripped over something in the dark. She fell to her knees with a sharp curse. Her fingers reached back and discovered a pack on the floor.
“Who’s there?” a voice asked from beyond the back door. A silhouetted figure stepped into the frame of the doorway.
On her knees, Kelly felt a moment of sheer terror.
Thunder echoed, and a new flicker of lightning revealed the identity of the dark figure. “Nate?” she asked timidly, embarrassed. “It’s Kelly.”
He crossed quickly to her and helped her to her feet. “What are you doing here?”
She wiped the wet strands of hair from her face, now burning hotly. What a fool he must think I am. “I…I stumbled into the wrong room. Sorry.”
“Are you okay?” Nate’s hands still held her arms, his palms warm through her soaked shirt.
“I’m fine. Just feeling especially foolish.”
“No reason to be. It’s dark.”
Lightning crackled, and she found his eyes on hers. They stared at each other in silence.
Finally, Nate spoke. “How’s Frank?”
“Fine,” she said in a hushed voice. Thunder boomed distantly, rolling over them, making the world seem much larger, them much smaller. Her voice was now a whisper. “I…I never said…I was sorry to hear about your father.”
“Thanks.”
His single word, softly spoken, echoed with old pain. She moved a step toward him, unwilled, a moth drawn to a flame, knowing she would be destroyed but having no choice. His sorrow touched something inside her. That hard and fast wall around her heart weakened. Tears again welled in her eyes. Her shoulders began to tremble.
“Hush,” he said, though she hadn’t said a word. He pulled her closer to him, arms wrapping around her shoulder.
The trembling became sobs. All the grief and terror she had held in her heart released in a blinding torrent. Her knees gave out, but Nate caught her in his grip and lowered her to the floor. He held her tight, his heart beating against hers.
They remained on the floor in the center of the room as the storm raged outside, swaying the trees, booming with the clash of Titans. At last, she glanced up toward Nate.
She reached up to him and pulled his lips to hers. She tasted the salt of his own tears, of hers. At first, it was just survival in the face of the intense sorrow, but as their lips opened, an unspoken hunger awoke. She felt his pulse quicken.
He pulled away for a moment, gasping. His eyes were bright, so very bright in the darkness.
“Kelly…”
“Hush,” she sighed, using his own word. She pulled him back to her.
Wrapped in each other’s arms, they lowered themselves to the floor. Palms explored…fingers loosened and peeled away damp clothes…limbs entwined.
As the storm hammered, their passions grew white hot. Grief faded away, lost somewhere between pain and pleasure, age-old rhythms and silent cries. They found the room too small, falling out onto the back deck.
Lightning rode the clouds, thunder roaring. Rain lashed under the awning, sweeping across their bare skin.
Nate’s mouth was hot on her breast, on her throat. She arched into him, eyes closed, lightning flaring red through her lids. His lips moved to hers, hungry, their breath shared. Under the storm, under him, she felt the exquisite tension build inside her, at first slowly, then ever more rapidly, swelling through and out of her as she cried into his lips.
He met her cry with his own, sounding like thunder in her ears.
For an untold time, they held that moment. Lost to the world, lost to the storm, but not lost to each other.
Act Five
Root
UNA DE GATO, “CAT’S CLAW”
family: Rubiaceae
genus: Uncaria
species: Tomentosa, Guianensis
common names: Cat’s Claw, Una de Gato, paraguayo, Garabato, Garbato Casha, Samento, Toroñ, Tambor Huasca, Aun Huasca, Una de Gavilan, Hawk’s Claw
part used: Bark, Root, Leaves
properties/actions: Antibacterial, Antioxidant, Antiinflammatory, Antitumorous, Antiviral, Cytostatic, Depurative, Diuretic, Hypotensive, Immunostimulant, Vermifuge, Antimutagenic
Sixteen
Betrayal
AUGUST 17, 7:05 A.M.
AMAZON JUNGLE
Nate woke to find his arms around a naked woman. Her eyes were already open. “Good morning,” he said.
Kelly inched closer to him. He could still smell the rain on her skin. She smiled. “It’s been morning for some time.”
He rose to one elbow, which wasn’t easy in a hammock, and stared down into her face. “Why didn’t you wake me?”
“I figured you could use at least one full hour of sleep.” She rolled out of the hammock, setting it swinging, and artfully drew off the single blanket and wrapped it around her.
With one hand, he grasped for her.
She stepped out of reach. “We have a long day ahead of us.”
With a groan, he rolled to his feet and pulled his boxers from the pile of hastily discarded clothes as Kelly gathered her things. Through the rear door to the room, he stared out at the jungle.
Last night, he and Kelly had talked into the wee hours of the morning, about fathers, brothers, daughters, lives, and losses. There were still more tears. Afterward they had made love again, slower, with less urgency, but with a deeper passion. Sated, they had collapsed into the hammock to catch a few hours of sleep before dawn.
Stepping onto the rear deck, Nate studied the forest. The morning skies were blue and clear, last night’s storm long gone, the light sharp and bright. Raindrops still clung to every leaf and blade, glistening like jewels. But that wasn’t all. “You should see this,” he called back to the room.
Kelly, now dressed in her khakis with her shirt half buttoned, joined him. He glanced to her, stunned again by her beauty. Her eyes widened as she stared beyond the deck’s edge. “How marvelous…”
She leaned into him, and he instinctively circled her with his arm.
Covering the upper limbs of the tree, drawn by the moisture, were hundreds of butterflies, perched on branches and leaves, fluttering through the bower. Each had wings about a handspan wide, brilliant blue and crystalline green.
“Morpho species,” Nate said. “But I’ve never seen this color pattern.”