Stranded Temptation: A Flaming Romance Read online

  Max tromped through the bushes nearby. She needed to find him before it was too late. No telling how many more of these were around. “Max,” she called out, “don’t move.”

  “Why?” he said. He heard the concern in her voice and she heard the panic in his.

  “I’m okay—”

  “I’m coming to you,” he said.

  “No, Max,” Kara enforced, “Don’t move.” She picked up another run of wire along the ground, heading in the direction Max was coming. “Max, stand still.” Of course, he didn’t. Goddamn, obstinate men. If they just listened to women, everyone’s lives would be so much better.

  She followed the line to another tree. Then she figured out what the holes cut into the boxes were—exit points for arrows to shoot out when someone tripped the wire. “Max, don’t move.” That time she heard the panic in her own voice.

  “Kara?” he asked.

  Shit. He was walking right into the area. He probably wouldn’t notice the trip wire. She didn’t until she saw the killing mechanism in the branches.

  She saw Max headed in her direction. He was following her trail. The only way to make him stop was to take him down. And she would. Running and watching for traps at the same time was hard to do. Coming around a brush thicket a wire delved through, Kara jumped and tackled Max to the ground.

  “Damn, baby,” he said, “if this gets you all riled up, we can run around my house every morning and night.”

  She dropped her head onto his chest. “Max, shut up.” She sighed then realized what come out of his mouth. “Who said you were getting sex twice a day?”

  “Oh, come on, baby. I’ll never get enough of you.”

  “Aww,” she cooed, “that’s so sweet, but if don’t listen to me, you will be a water fountain with several holes for water to pour out.”

  His brows turned down. “What are you talking about?”

  “This area is covered in booby traps,” she said.

  He cupped her breast. “Nice boobies, too.”

  She slapped his hand away. “Would you please focus. I’m trying to keep us alive.”

  He looked into her face. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, look.” She sat up and ran her fingers under the wire he was getting ready to step on. “Up there,” she pointed at a tree with a box of arrows stashed among the branches, “those would’ve put at least half a dozen holes in you.”

  “Well,” Max said, “seems that whoever lives here isn’t keen on having visitors.”

  “This could be how they get their meat, too,” she replied. “Doesn’t have to be a security thing.”

  Max grunted, getting up. “That seems a bit excessive for catching a deer. If there are even deer on this island. I haven’t seen signs of bigger animals.”

  Kara chewed on her lip. Now that she thought about it, she hadn’t either. “Welcome or not, if this guy has a way to communicate off the island, we need his help. We can go straight back to camp after we make a call.”

  “Baby,” Max said, “if we don’t get reception, how can anyone else on this island get it?”

  She jammed her fists on her hips. “I don’t know. Maybe he has two damn tin cans strung together.”

  Max offered up his hands in surrender. “Sorry, babe, just asking.”

  Kara sighed and brushed hair from her face. “Sorry. I’m just...” She was just about everything—tired, hungry, soaked in muddy water, dying for the bottle of wine Meghan gave her. She already drank that. Damn.

  He put his arms around her and drew her into him. Even though he was muddy too, he still smelled like the man she loved. She leaned into him, letting her body and mind relax for a moment.

  The forest surrounded and calmed her like it did when she was little. Whenever she needed an escape from the world’s stress, she’d ensconce herself in nature and she’d find balance once again.

  Except one sound didn’t belong in nature. A hum or buzzing in the distance wasn’t a hive of bumble bees. “You hear that?”

  “Yup,” he answered. “Sounds like a generator to me. Someone is definitely here.” He released his hold around her and took her hand. “Let’s go see who it is, and how unfriendly they are.”

  18

  Watching for trip wires and other traps in the densely wooded area, Max guided Kara toward the generator they heard earlier. He wondered how someone could survive without electricity in this day and age. He got his answer.

  The closer the got to the sound, the more noise they heard. If he was correct, he heard heavy truck engines and enough voices to host a village.

  He put his finger to his lips and signaled to Kara to keep quiet. She nodded and slipped through the trees behind him. They came to a rusted chain-link fence that had been woven through the trees to make somewhat of a straight line.

  What Max saw on the other side baffled him. Several small, shabby, aluminum siding buildings scattered the area, each looked capable of falling over in the breeze. How they withstood the storm that blew in a short time ago, he had no clue.

  Even more puzzling were the thirty-so men dressed in a mixture of camo pants and T-shirts. Groups were separated and doing different tasks. One group unloaded wooden crates from the back of an old military transport truck and set them next to a larger group standing at worktables consisting of plywood resting on sawhorses.

  From the open crates, men took out dolls wearing white dresses, tore the heads off, and tossed each half into fifty-gallon drums. What the fuck was going on? A man came out of one of the buildings carrying a long metal tray neatly stacked with headless dolls. He set it in front of another group of tables then took the large drum of newly headless bodies back into the shack.

  The group with the stacked dolls returned the heads back onto the dolls and re-crated them. The guys who worked at the trucks hammered lids onto the crates and loaded them into the back of the vehicles which then drove off.

  Kara tug on Max’s shirt. “What do you think they’re doing?”

  “I’m not sure,” he said, “but if I had to guess, I’d say they were sneaking in drugs through toy dolls.”

  “What?” Kara said.

  “They take the heads off, stuff the bodies with packaged product, put the heads back on, then back into the crate,” Max surmised.

  “Where are the crates coming from?” Kara asked.

  “Good question,” Max said. “Let’s find out.”

  He took Kara’s hand and they backed away from the fence. Following the direction and sound of the military truck, they made their way through the jungle. A bright spot among the trees caught his eye. Changing course, he headed in that direction.

  Kara said, “It looks just like the other treeless circle, but...” she stared up at the see-through material dozens of feet above the ground and stretched from tree to tree around the perimeter, “is that a mosquito net covering the whole circle?”

  Max stood with fists on his hips, looking up. “I’d wager from the air, it looks like the surrounding canopy.”

  “You’re saying the netting is hiding the opening?” Kara asked.

  “Yep,” Max squatted, examining the plants. He picked a leaf and studied the front and the back side.

  “Let me guess,” Kara said, “coca plant.”

  “You got it.” He stood and shook his head. “C’mon. Let’s see where the truck went.”

  Following the dirt path, they come out at a beach. Hiding behind a dune, they watched the activity. With the sun beginning to set behind them, the view of the water and sky were crystal clear.

  Here, more men loaded and unloaded the trucks from a small ferry-like boat filled with crates. One man slapped the side of the ferry, hollered out, and the boat headed out toward a cargo ship not far from the island. Several names were printed on the carrier crates: Marigold, CalTek, CMS and the usual that Max recognized as vendors and competitors in the shipping business. More boats ferried crates to and from the beach.

  Max said, “Well, here’s your a
nswer. The crates are from a vessel which looks to be headed north to the US.” In the sky beyond the ship, a dark spot floated between the clouds. A pair of binoculars would’ve been great to have.

  “Oh my God,” Kara said, “this is a drug ring.” Behind them, automatic rifle shots sounded and the sand next to them erupted into the air. Men with guns ran out from the trees, yelling, and surrounded them.

  With the rifles pointed at their faces, Max and Kara lifted their hands. The men walked them onto the beach and forced to them into the back of a truck. Max figured they were getting the scenic tour to the compound.

  Kara’s grip on his arm was about to cut off blood circulation. He patted her hand to assure her they would be all right. He hoped. The bumpy ride was short and when the truck stopped, the tailgate dropped, and they were forced out. Two of the more official looking men spoke quietly in Spanish and pointed toward a shack.

  Max and Kara were pushed in that direction, shoved inside, and the door locked behind them.

  The two looked around the hot interior to find little. Broken crates, a rusty set of large rims, several fuel cans, and rags smeared with oil.

  Kara plopped down on a rim, burying her face in her hands. “We’re fucked, aren’t we?”

  He looked at her. “Why do you say that?”

  She glanced at him with her mouth gaping. “How can you think we’re not?”

  “We have an ace in the hole?” he said.

  “We’re sure as hell in a hole,” she replied.

  He didn’t want to let on what their advantage was so she wouldn’t accidentally give them away or be forced to reveal anything. He tugged on the small window, hearing the glass rattle, but the vertical rebar poles embedded from top to bottom were solid. No pulling down the jailhouse wall for a wild west escape.

  Noise rambled outside the door. With squeaks and a metal-on-metal grind, the aluminum panel pretending to be a door opened. A man with a gun gestured for them to step out. He pushed them toward a nicer structure that appeared more stable than anything else there.

  Inside was a decorated office with kitchenette and air conditioning. A man dressed in full camo fatigues laid a cell phone on the desk and spoke Spanish with their escort.

  Max nodded and grinned. “Excuse me, do you speak English?”

  The man behind the desk stood. “Yes, señor. I am interested in who you are and why you are trespassing on my island.”

  “Believe me,” Max said, “trespassing wasn’t part of our original plan. Our plane crashed on the south side of the island and we need to call someone.”

  “Plane crash? South side?” the man said. “And you remain alive?”

  Max nodded. The two Latins rambled back and forth as if debating. “Also, I’d like you to know I am very rich and powerful in the States.”

  The man behind the desk looked at him and smiled, gold tooth shining.

  19

  Kara dug her elbow into Max’s side. What the hell was he thinking, telling their abductors he had money? “What are you doing?” she said. “Don’t tell them that.”

  Max put a finger to his lips and signaled for her to remain calm. She’d remain calm if he would stop saying stupid things. Now, there was no telling what the guerrillas were going to do with them. Hold them for ransom was looking like a great possibility.

  Max shook the main guy’s hand and introduced himself. She couldn’t believe it. Did he not comprehend what was going on? Did he hit his head and she hadn’t see it?

  “Excuse me,” she interrupted and turned to Max, “can I talk to you for a second?” She tugged him to the side and stood where he blocked her from their host’s sight. “What is wrong with you?”

  “It’s okay, baby. I got this,” he replied.

  “You got what? Brain damage?” she whispered, anger spilling over.

  He scowled. “No. I’ll tell you later. We need to get back to our prison cell immediately.”

  “Why do we want that?” she asked. He took her hand and yanked her toward the desk.

  He ignored her question and spoke to the main guy. “We’ll go back to our small room and let you do whatever you were doing.”

  She and the leader gave Max the same expression—WTF? After a pause, the camo-clad guy spoke to the one with the gun and they left, escorted back to their shack. As soon as the door closed, Kara punched him in the arm.

  “You’d better have one damn good explanation for doing everything you’re not supposed to do when abducted.”

  “What?” Max said, “You have a to-do when kidnapped list?”

  “Right next to my what to do in a zombie apocalypse list.”

  “I had my reasons,” Max said, dashing from corner to corner gathering junk lying around.

  “Any time you’d like to share, I’m all ears,” she replied.

  “First off, I speak fluent Spanish,” he said.

  When his words sank in, she about laughed out loud. “What all did they say?”

  For a moment, he was quiet. Avoiding the question? “Max?”

  “Let’s just say they had different plans than to keep us alive. We were of no use to them.”

  Her stomach roiled. The drug dealers were going to kill them right out. “That’s why you told them you had money?”

  “Yup,” he replied, tying dirty rags together.

  “So you’ve managed to stall them a while,” Kara pieced together. “They’ll verify your identity and send a ransom note. That will take at least a day if not two.”

  “We don’t have that much time.” Max opened the fuel containers and poured any remaining liquid into one.

  “Why not? What are you doing?” she asked.

  He pulled his pocketknife from his shorts and tossed it to her. “In the back corner, I need you to cut through the aluminum sheet to create a hole big enough for us to easily crawl out of.”

  “But they’ll see us,” she said. “We’re surrounded.”

  “Not for long.”

  The sun had begun to cross the horizon not too long ago and the densely wooded area was turning dark quickly. Studying the compound, she noted there were no lights poles or electricity wires installed. With the sunlight diminishing, they would have to shut down stuffing dolls full of cocaine. For the night at least.

  Noticing how Max rushed around, she asked, “Are we in a hurry for any reason?”

  “When we were on the beach a short time ago, watching the cargo, I saw a black spot in the air. I realized while we were inside that it was probably a helicopter searching for us.”

  “What?” Kara about came out of her skin. “We have to signal them. We-we need to contact them. How far away were they?”

  “Did you notice them flying?” he asked.

  “No,” she replied.

  “Then they were a good distance off. Probably coming in from searching the ocean farther north.”

  That was enough explanation for her. She hurried to the back corner and cut two parallel lines three feet apart, wide enough for even her ass to pass through in a rapid crawl. From the top of one line to the other, she sliced a horizontal line, leaving a thread uncut to hold the section in place until they were ready to storm out.

  The work outside grinded to a halt. Crates were closed and loaded onto the truck, doors were locked with keypads and chains, and the men strode to a building alongside the office. When silence settled over the area, no one would be able to see them make their escape.

  Max took his knife back from her and cut a smaller hole on the other side of the building at ground level. From there, he slid through a metal fuel can with a rope of tied rags sticking out the top.

  She had no idea what he was doing. They were wasting time they should be running to the beach. They could make a fire to hopefully catch the searchers’ attention, but by then, they may be too far away to notice.

  She wanted to yell at him to hurry up, but she trusted he knew what he was doing. He was a golden tiger. She’d kick his ass if she found out he was making up
all that survival training garbage.

  Making his way next to her, he pulled a rock from his pocket. “Are you ready to run?” he asked.

  “No, I’m ready for a bottle of wine, candles, and hot tub full of bubbles. But let’s get going,” she replied. Kara tore away the thin metal section of wall and crawled out. She got to her feet, ready to take off, then stumbled when Max wasn’t behind her.

  She dropped to the ground and crawled back to the hole. “What the hell are you doing? Come on.”

  Max crouched where he was when she exited, swiping his knife over the rock he pulled from his pocket. She realized that wasn’t only a rock, but a piece of flint they used earlier to light the small fire in the shelter.

  “Max,” she said calmly, “what is on the other side of the wall where you shoved the gas can?”

  The side of his mouth turned up. She smiled, knowing the answer. He said, “A hundred-gallon tank full of explosive fuel.”

  “Our smoke signal to the rescue crew,” she commented.

  “Yup,” he said, striking the rock and sending sparks to catch fire to the oil rags. “Go, go, go.”

  Kara scrambled to her feet, keeping low, and headed toward the back of the compound. In the dark, no one inside would see them. When Max was behind her, she sprinted for the path that led to the beach.

  Halfway there, it dawned on her. “Max,” she said between huffs, “after the explosion, they will come looking for us. You told them where we crashed.”

  He pushed her to keep going. “I told them we crashed on the south side.”

  “It was the north side,” she replied.

  “Exactly.”

  Her heart was elated. How could she not trust him? He would keep her safe no matter what. From now on, she wouldn’t question him. Just simple complete trust. Maybe.

  The ground shook and a loud explosion erupted behind them a good distance, but they were still thrown to the dirt. Lying on her back, Kara watched a bright red and black mushroom cloud the size of a small city rise into the night. If the boys in the helicopter missed that, they were freaking blind.