Page 12 of The Hero
“Do you forgive me for doing that back there?”
She snorted. “For doing what? Having an ID for me? Distracting the cops so they wouldn’t look at my prison-issue shoes? Giving me a kiss that curled my toes and made me forget for just a moment that my life has gone to shit? Yeah, Kendric. I forgive you.”
“Curled your toes?” he asked, turning his head slightly so she could see his grin.
Marlowe realized she was also smiling like a loon. “Yeah.”
“Me too,” he admitted.
She closed her eyes for a moment. The admission that he’d been just as affected by the spontaneous kiss seeped into her bones. Made her feel as if maybe she’d get back to the woman she’d been before getting thrown in jail.
Suddenly overwhelmed with gratitude, she hugged Kendric hard.
He squeezed her hand and said, “We’re going to be at our stopping point in just a few minutes. The Cambodian border isn’t too far, just the equivalent of about three hundred miles. But the roads aren’t great outside the city. We can’t go as fast as I’d like on this scooter, and I don’t want to look suspicious to any authorities we might run into along the way, so we’ll take our time. Act like tourists. My plan is to lay low during the day and set out again after dark. That okay?”
“This is your rescue. I’ll do whatever you say, when you say it, as soon as you say it.”
He twisted his neck and caught her gaze for a second before returning his attention to the road. “Yeah?”
Remarkably, she giggled. “Well, maybe I should clarify that.”
“You’re safe with me,” Kendric fired back, no humor in his tone at all.
“I know,” Marlowe told him. And she did. She felt safer with this man than she had in a very long time. Maybe ever. There was justsomething about him that screamed safety. She didn’t know much about him, but one thing was clear—he’d do whatever it took to get her back to her brother, even if that meant getting hurt himself.
And the more time she spent with him, the more abhorrent that idea was. She didn’t want him getting injured on her behalf. Or killed. She shivered at the thought.
“Cold?”
That. Right there. He was so in tune with her, it was almost scary. “No, just an unpleasant thought.”
“Soon this will all be a bad dream,” he reassured her.
“Will they come to the States to get me?” she couldn’t help but ask.
“No.”
His answer was short and to the point. “How can you be sure?”
“I just am. Trust me, Punky.”
Not wanting to think about being hauled out of her bed in the middle of the night by immigration or the FBI or someone hell bent on sending her back to Thailand, Marlowe nodded against him.
About ten minutes later, Kendric slowed and once again steered the scooter between the slates of a fence, into a wooden building that looked as if it was one strong storm from being blown over. He turned off the engine and hopped off the seat. Then he took her arm in his and said, “Slowly.”
Wondering why he was so concerned, Marlowe swung her leg over the seat and stood—and immediately swayed on her feet. Her legs didn’t seem to want to work. “Oh!” she exclaimed.
“Give it a moment for the blood to start flowing again,” he told her, still holding her steady.
“You just leaped off as if you weren’t on there the same amount of time I was,” she complained.
Kendric’s lips twitched. “I’m used to it. Come on, lean on me and we’ll head inside.”
“Wait. Kendric?”
“Yeah?”
“Will being around me put anyone else in danger?”
