Forbidden River (The Legionnaires #2.5)(23)

“Which was?”

“They were committing massive fraud and tax evasion. Usual story—the company was failing but they kept lying to shareholders to prop it up, lying to the tax department, hoping they could work their way out of it. But it just got worse until... Two years ago I was on transport duty in Iraq when Tane sent word. They’d been arrested—him, too. It was one of the biggest fraud cases in New Zealand.”

“Tane?” he said, carefully matching her pronunciation. Tah-nay.

“My brother. He very narrowly avoided jail. He’d been working with them a few years, but they’d kept him in the dark and he managed to prove it. The whole thing broke him, though.”

“Ah, man, that’s tough.”

“Sucks to be us, eh?”

He met her gaze, shielding the light, and grinned. “Sure does.”

She chewed her bottom lip and his gaze dropped to it, making her décolletage warm. If she leaned in a little and he leaned in a little... Her breath shallowed out. His jaw twitched and he looked away. As he grabbed another dressing, she allowed herself a full inhalation. Turned out she was a sucker for a sexy man listening to her pity party.

She eased back onto her elbows, buying some distance. “So this solo kayaking thing. Is it a tribute to your brother?”

“Exactly that,” he said, resuming his task. “Once a year, every year since—except when I enlisted and hadn’t earned the leave. Before he died, we narrowed down a list of the wildest runs in the world and made a pact to kayak them. We’d only just started when...”

“So you’re finishing it for him.”

“And for me. When I’m alone in a place like this, I can imagine he’s here with me. This is gonna make me sound crazy but...” He shook his head.

“Hey, I already think you’re crazy.”

He smiled, a meltingly sad smile. “After a day or so I hear his voice. It keeps him alive for me, kind of fills up the hollow.” He tapped his chest. So he had a hole there and she had a knot. “And when I’m kayaking, when it gets gnarly and I have to focus, the world vanishes. I feel like me again—the me I used to be.”

“Some people meditate to get that feeling.”

“If only that worked. But then, if it did, I wouldn’t be here right now with...” He glanced up, then quickly back down, like he had a guilty conscience.

Here with...her?

No. He couldn’t mean that, not in the way it sounded.

“But every year it’s harder to bring him back,” he continued. “He’s fading.”

“A psychologist would probably say that’s natural, healthy.”

“Would that psychologist also say you’re hiding down here from what happened with your folks?”

“Mate, I don’t need a psychologist to tell me that’s what I’m doing. But I’m happy enough. Down here I’m less my criminal parents’ daughter and more my koro’s mokopuna—his grandchild. And most of my clients are tourists who have no idea of my history and couldn’t care less.” Hang on—when did the attention land back on her? “So...your parents are still in Texas?”

“Yep.”

“Let me guess—they’re not so keen on their surviving son running off to fight someone else’s wars?”

“See now, you’re the psychic one.” He stroked her calf—checking for more damage. She resisted the urge to shiver. Now that the pain had subsided, she was buzzing with far more interesting sensations. “That’s as good as we’re gonna get it. I’ll tape it all up.” He rummaged in the kit. “Yep, I lived the cliché and ran away to the legion.”

“And when you take leave you run even further.”

He raised his eyebrows as he tore the wrapping off a roll of tape. At some point he’d dropped the devil-may-care act. This was a guy who thought deeply, felt deeply and was man enough to share. “And the farther and longer I run, the less I want to go back. I guess one day I’ll find the point of no return and the decision will be made for me.”

“Oh God, you do have a death wish. And I’m stuck with you.”

He laughed. “Don’t worry. I have excellent luck. But I leave my fate up to fate. If I die, I die.”

“That’s supposed to make me feel better?”

“Hey, I take every precaution. I make it hard for Death, but I’m not scared of it.” He fixed an end of tape on her shin and began winding it. “Ah man, I don’t usually dump this shit on people I’ve just met—or even people I’ve known for years.”

“It’s being out here. Like you say, the real world doesn’t exist.”

He nodded, making the light nod, too. As he smoothed on the tape, he followed its path with a warm, rough hand, which sent a whole lot of inappropriate tingling up her legs. It was sexy, the way he concentrated—the way he concentrated on her.

“So you live with your koro?” he asked, his pronunciation perfect—the long vowels, the rolled R.

“Yeah.”

“Will he worry when you don’t come home tonight?”

“Nah, I stay out a lot.”

“Do you, now?” He grinned.

“Not like that! Sometimes I fly up to remote huts when no one is booked in and stay a night or two. Tane and Koro will assume I’m overnighting somewhere. Everyone around here knows not to worry if I don’t radio in for a while—the coverage can be patchy.”