Read Online Her Last Line of Defense by Marie Donovan - Free Book Online

wiped a hand across his face and muttered several words under his breath. “I need to teach you that, too?”
    She wanted to dig a hole in the larva-ridden ground and climb in. Mental toughness, mental toughness. She stuck out her chin at him. “Yes, you do.”
    “It’s simple. Pick a tree, pull down your pants and do your business.”
    “But how do I wipe?”
    “You don’t.”
    “Oh, Luc.” The idea of having to drip-dry was too much to stand right now.
    “Okay.” He blew out another French-sounding sigh and selected a leaf from a nearby tree. “Learn this leaf. Memorize it. Love it, because this is your new T.P. Don’t use anything else.”
    She accepted the leaf and hastily did her business behind some ancient tree. She felt as if she were vandalizing it. Anyway, the next rainstorm would take care of it.
    When she returned, he handed her another canteen and pointed her to a big log, where she sat. “Drink.”
    She tipped it to her mouth and grimaced. “What’s that?”
    “Treated water with ORS—oral rehydration salts. You’ll need to drink all of this plus another. I want to see you running into the woods with another tree leaf within two hours.”
    “Fine.” She forced herself to drink because she knew he’d meant it about sending her home. How humiliating that would be—not even managing twelve hours in the wilderness. Poor Claire, people would snicker, sent home because she couldn’t pee in the woods.
    She chugged the rest of the canteen and he handed her another. “Here’s our next lesson—the jungle is full of fresh water. There’s no reason to get dehydrated or overheated. One school of thought says to drink what you can find and get rid of the parasitic infections later. But that’s a last resort. So treat your water.” He went on to describe several treatment methods, as well as how to drink from water vines and how to catch rainwater in a variety of containers. “San Lucas gets four hundred inches of rain per year—about ten times what Virginia gets, so that’s plenty. You still have to treat it since you don’t know what it carried down from the trees, but it’s easy.”
    Claire was beginning to recover, with her second canteenful sloshing around in her stomach, and watching Luc’s firm lips shape words and sentences was a lot of fun. His five-o’clock shadow only made him look more dashing and dangerous. Apparently the only danger he ran away from was the notion of having sex with her. She didn’t know if that was a compliment or not.
    “Claire! Claire!” He scowled at her. “Are you paying attention to me?”
    “Of course.” She’d been drinking in every detail of his rock-hard body under the black T-shirt and green camo pants. But he meant if she was paying attention to what he was saying. She repeated the last few paragraphs of his lecture, grateful for how she could remember large chunks of information presented orally. Her brain had a digital audio recorder.
    “Okay.” He slitted his eyes, not quite believing her. “You need to finish your sleeping platform if you’re better.” He extended his hand to help her stand and she accepted.
    He misjudged her weight and pulled a little too hard, dragging her chest-to-chest with him. She stared into his eyes. They weren’t quite solid black but had some gold flecks in them. “Luc,” she whispered, her breasts nestled against his solid torso.
    “Claire,” he whispered back. “I need you….”
    “What?” Were his defenses crumbling faster than she’d hoped?
    “I need you to…get off my foot and get busy!” His last words were almost a shout as he set her away from him. “Gon’ go hunt for dinner now. Don’t let the fire go out unless you’d prefer snake sushi.”
    She slumped in disappointment as he disappeared into the brush. Then she remembered his last words. Snake sushi? Her stomach churned. She fed the fire with some dry branches and chanted under her breath, “Tastes like chicken, tastes like