Page 34 of Keeping Amanda
Hating the fear he heard in Mandy’s voice, after one last affectionate stroke of the dog’s head, he faced her.
“They’re looking for us,” she guessed.
“Wrong. They have no ideawhothey’re looking for, or if there’s anyone to find at all. They’re here just in case someone didn’t get on that chopper. They don’t know for sure. That works in our favor. We just have to be more cautious from here on out. And them patrolling in this area lets us know that we’reclose to Guyana. Besides, Rain will alert us to anyone who might be out there.”
His words seemed to calm some of the anxiousness Mandy was feeling. He saw her shoulders relax a fraction. “If we’d kept going in the direction we were going before…we might’ve run right into the rebels, wouldn’t we?”
“There’s no way to know for sure, but I’m guessing so, yes.”
Moving slowly, Mandy let go of his hand and moved around him on her knees until Rain was between them. She leaned down and kissed the top of the dog’s head. The look Rain gave her, Buck could only describe as adoration. He could relate; he had the same feelings toward this woman.
“Thank you, Rain. You did good. So good. You’re so smart and brave. You didn’t know how we’d react to your growling. We could’ve gotten mad or thrown something at you, but you didn’t want us to go that way, did you? So you herded us this way. Did I say you were smart? You’re the smartest dog in the world!”
The whole time she was speaking, she was stroking Rain’s head and back. The dog seemed to arch into her touch, and he’d completely stopped shaking.
Mandy took a deep breath and looked up at Buck. “What now?”
“We keep walking. Following Rain’s lead.”
“I mean, I know I said he was smart…” To Buck’s amusement, Mandy covered the dog’s ears with her hands before continuing. “But do we really trust him to lead us to the border? He could actually lead us west, toward some unknown place he came from.”
She was so damn cute. Buck touched the compass hanging from his flight suit. “I have a compass, remember?”
“Oh, yeah.” She was back to petting Rain’s head now.
“Besides, where he came from obviously wasn’t a good place. Especially if it was with the rebels who’d joined the camp themorning the kids were rescued. You saw how terrified he was of the two men who were talking. How hard he was shaking.”
“Right. Nash?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m taking him with me when we leave. I’m not leaving him here. I can’t.”
Buck wasn’t exactly surprised by her declaration. She wouldn’t be the woman he admired and wanted in his life if she could turn her back on Rain.
“Okay.”
“Okay?” she asked with an adorable tilt of her head. She had dirt on her cheeks, a scrape on her forehead from a branch she hadn’t ducked under fast enough, and her hair was sticking up in spikes all over her head. And he’d never seen a more beautiful woman in his life.
“Yeah, okay. I’ll do whatever I can to help. There will be a bunch of red tape. He’ll need inoculations, licenses, maybe a letter from a veterinarian. I don’t know. But we’ll figure it out.”
She stared at him for a moment, then went up to her knees and lunged at him over Rain’s prone position between them. “Thank you.”
“You don’t have to thank me. I’ve become pretty attached to the little guy myself.”
She pulled back, much to Buck’s disappointment. He loved the feel of her against him. “Oh, did you want to take him home withyou?”
“He likes me, but he’s devoted to you,” Buck said with a shake of his head. “He belongs to you. But I wouldn’t mind visitation rights.”
Her smile lit up her face. “Of course.”
It seemed so…normal to be talking about visitation rights for a dog, as if the outcome of their little jaunt through the jungle was a given thing. And as far as Buck was concerned, it was. There was no way they’d get this close to freedom, only to let the rebels find them now. He’d get Mandy, and Rain, safely across the border or die trying.
Not that he wanted to die. No, he had things he wanted to do with his life. Namely, get to know the woman next to him without worrying about things like finding food, being hunted, and not getting bitten by the hundreds of deadly critters crawling and slinking around this rainforest.
“I’m thinking now is our chance to head due east,” he said. “Obviously I don’t know the perimeter the rebels are walking to search for someone who may or may not be trying to get to Guyana, but since they just went by, I’m guessing we have a window of opportunity to slip past them.”
Mandy nodded. “I trust you. Whatever you think is best, that’s what we’ll do. Lord knows I have no clue about anything out here.”
