“Okay,” I say, and press my body up against his back, because I’m terrified. I slip my hand out of the sling and wrap my arms around his waist. His back is broad enough that if I hunch down, maybe hungry caimans won’t notice me. I press my cheek to his spine and close my eyes.
Minutes pass. Long, long freaking minutes. I get nervous, because I hear splashing, but we’re still not budging. Under my cheek, I hear Rafe’s heart racing, but he’s not moved a muscle. I open my eyes again and try to peer over his shoulder. “Are they gone?”
“Soon,” he says, and his voice is a bit strangled.
“Can I see?” I whisper in his ear. “Is it safe?”
“Shh,” he says, and quietly removes my arms from his waist, careful not to touch my bruised hand and wrist. He’s pulling me away from him, and I can guess the reason why. Hands at his belt are too close to below the belt.
For some reason, that annoys me. Not again. Are we going to have to go through this constantly? Pussyfooting around the fact that he’s got a big dick and he’s attracted to me?
Can’t a girl climb on a man in terror without him getting wood?
We need to get past this. I refuse to sleep another night afraid to move a muscle because Mendoza gets a stiffy the size of a rowboat. Something has to change. We have to become more comfortable with each other if we’re going to survive. It’s stressing me out and I feel stressed enough as it is.
“It’s gone,” Mendoza says after a long moment. I’m still stewing, so I don’t respond. He prods the ground in front of him and then gestures for me to follow. “Come on.”
I make a face at his back, but I follow.
I’ve heard the river in the background all night, but this is my first chance to see it. Churning brown water filled with logs and debris meets my eyes. It’s wide and looks deep, and trees overhang on both sides. The banks are muddy and steep. It looks rather forbidding. “Please tell me we’re not going swimming in that,” I say faintly.
“Can’t,” he says. “Piranhas.”
“Oh good,” I say sarcastically. “Thank God there are man-eating fish in the closest body of water. That sure makes me feel safe.”
“Stay here,” he says, and moves toward the riverbank. “It’s steep so I’ll get the mud for us.”
“Not moving,” I say, hugging my arms to my chest. Piranhas, caimans, bugs, and bird-eating spiders. Boy, camping sure is fun. Boy, I never want to leave the city ever again.
Rafe slides a leg toward the steep riverbank, using his walking stick to brace himself on the side of the bank. He gets a handful of mud and then climbs back toward me. “Here, I’ll do you.”
“Please do.” Damn it, even that sounds ridiculously oversexed. I turn my back and lift my hair, and he slathers wet mud on my neck. And I can’t help it. I squeal and shudder a bit.
I hear him inhale sharply. He pauses, and then his hand brushes across my shoulders brusquely. “Hang on,” he says in a flat voice. “I’ll get more mud.”
I turn and look as he heads back to the river, and sure enough, he’s sporting another erection. This can’t continue. We need to be a team. And not in a sexual way. Just comfortable with each other if nothing else, and it isn’t going to work if he’s constantly worried about touching me. Right now? He could grope my tits and if it was for my safety, I wouldn’t care. It wouldn’t be a turn-on, but I wouldn’t lose my shit.
I’m not so sure about Mendoza.
Another thought occurs to me as he returns to my side and slathers more mud across my shoulders and down my good arm. What if the erections are a reaction to discomfort at being around me? I make him uncomfortable and his body responds in an embarrassing way? Kind of like dick Tourette’s? I feel a stab of sympathy for him. He’s so big and tough in every other way that I can’t imagine him being so uncomfortable around me.
An idea flashes in my head.
I’m a firm believer in taking this sort of thing head-on. So once he finishes smoothing the mud down my arm, I turn around and start to remove my shirt.
“Ava? What are you doing?”
“I’ll show you mine if you show me yours,” I tell him, hauling off my shirt. “Let’s get it all out in the open, okay?” No more wondering, no more speculating. I’ll see his dick will be normal-sized and I can stop staring at it. He’ll see me naked and realize that I should lose about fifteen to twenty pounds. Plus, I’m covered in bug bites.
We’ll have a good laugh at each other’s parts and then we’ll be comfortable around each other. End of story.
CHAPTER TWELVE
RAFAEL
She’s taking off her shirt. Holy mother of God. Her tits are barely covered by some lace that is almost the same color as her skin. She’s got nipples the size of erasers that are barely covered by a seam in the fabric, and the juicy flesh looks like it is ready to burst out of its restraints. As all the blood in my body drains south, I sway like a puppet whose strings have just been cut. I can’t walk or speak. I can only stare.