As always she surprised him, her laughter invading his senses and squeezing his heart. “If you’re trying to scare me, Rio, there’s nothing you can do I haven’t already seen. I’m not easily shocked or easily frightened. I knew the day my mother died, back when I was nine years old, that the world wasn’t a safe place and there were bad people in it.” She waved a dismissing hand, princess to the peasant. “Save your scare tactics for Kim Pang, or whoever else you want to impress.”

Rio gave the small leopard one last pat, reached out casually to scratch Franz’s ears before straightening to his full height, towering over her, filling the room with his extraordinary presence. He looked very uncivilized, completely untamed and at home in the wilds of the forest. When he moved, ther e was a fluid grace she’d only seen in predatory animals. When he ceased all movement, he was utterly, completely still. It was intimidating, but Rachael would never admit it.

“You’d be surprised at what I can do.” He said it quietly, and there was a soft, underlying menace to his tone.

Rachael’s heart skipped a beat, but she kept her expression serene and merely lifted her eyebrow in response, a gesture she’d worked hard to perfect. “You know what I think, Rio? I think you’re the one who’s afraid of me. I think you don’t quite know what to do with me.”

“I know what I’d like to do.” This time he sounded gruff.

“What did I say that upset you?”

Rio stood in front of her feeling like he’d been felled by a huge tree. He had closed that door so long ago, his emotions raw and bruised and bleeding, and he wasn’t about to open the door for her or anyone else. He couldn’t believe it still shook him, those occasional glimpses into a past he didn’t want to remember. A different life. A different person.

Rachael watched his hands curl into fists, the only sign of his agitation. She had inadvertently touched a nerve and had no idea what it was that had done it. She shrugged. “I have a past, you have a past, we’re both looking for a different life. Does it matter? You don’t have to tell me, Rio. I like who you are now.”

“Is that your way of subtly asking me to stay out of your business?”

She tugged at the hair at the back of her neck, obviously used to it being much longer. “I was saying it doesn’t matter. No, I don’t want you prying into my past. I shouldn’t have told you as much as I did.”

She smiled at him because she couldn’t help herself. She was acting out of character, telling things best left unsaid. She shouldn’t have hurt feelings because he didn’t want to spill his life’s story to her. She doubted he would have been hiding out in the rain forest unless something traumatic had happened in his lif e. He made her want to tell him ever ything. “I’ m sorry I made you uncomfortable, Rio. I won’t do it again.”

“Damn it, Rachael. How do you manage to do that?” One minute he could work up anger and the next she disarmed him completely. “And, by the way, how is it that you escape the mosquitoes? I only use the netting because they annoy me buzzing around, but I thought you would be covered in bites.”

“Mosquitoes don’t find me quite as charming as you do. I noticed all the others in my group were having to use repellent all the time. I don’t think mosquitoes like the way I taste. Does it bother you that they leave me alone?”

He nodded. “It’s a rare phenomenon. The mosquitoes don’t bother the tribespeople. Your mother knows the stories of the leopard people. Were you born here? Is your mother from here?”

Rachael laughed again. “I thought we just agreed not to pry into one another ‘s business and you can’t let three seconds go by without asking questions. I’m beginning to think you have a double standard, Rio.”

A slow, answering smile curved his mouth. “You could be right. I never thought of it that way.”

“And all this time I thought you were a modern sensitive New Age man,” she teased.

Franz growled, coming to his feet. At the same time, Rio leapt to one side of the door in the nearly impossible way he had of covering long distances. He signaled the cat to silence, drew his gun and simply waited.

Seven

The whistle came again, a soft one-two note. The gun never moved atall, remaining steady and aimed at the entrance. Rio answered, using a different combination of sounds, but he stayed motionless, simply waiting.

“Put the gun away,” Kim Pang said and pushed open the door. He stepped into the house, his clothes torn, damp and bloody, his tough features a mask of weariness. He had obviously been traveling fast and light. There was no pack and no weapon that Rachael could see.

Still, Rio remained in the shadows, to one side of the door. “I don’t think so, Kim,” Rio said softly,

“you didn’t come alone. Who’s with you?”

“My brother, Tama, and Drake Donovan have come as well. You were slow in answering and Drake is scouting while Tama covers me.” Kim remained very still. His gaze shifted to take in Rachael, but he gave no acknowledgment that he recognized her.

“Tama isn’t doing a very good job, Kim,” Rio said, but Rachael could see him visibly relax, although he did not put away the gun. “Signal him to come in.” He lifted his head and coughed, a peculiar grunting cough that sounded much like that of animals Rachael had heard in the distance when she was trekking through the forest.

Kim called out loudly in another dialect, his voice raised and harsh, but when he turned back, he was smiling at Rachael. “Miss Wilson, it is good to see that you made it out of the river alive. Your apparent demise caused quite an uproar.”