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Vicente translated, but the shaman shook his head. Again, he insisted that I must be marked.

I exchanged a worried glance with Slash and Vicente. “What are we going to do?”

Slash didn’t respond. He was staring at his hand, turning the rock over and over in his palm, thinking.

Vicente tugged on my arm, trying to calm me down. “Lexi, listen to me. He has to mark you because if he doesn’t, anyone could claim you again, including the chief. Slash would have to fight for you all over again. The younger, stronger warriors would also see it as a challenge, and they’d start lining up to take him on. If you want this to be official, you have to finish the ceremony.”

“I’mnotgetting branded, and we aren’t staying.”

“I don’t think they’ll let you go if you don’t finish the ceremony.”

Slash finally spoke up. “I have an idea. Vicente, ask the shaman to give us a minute.Cara, can you give me your engagement ring?”

“I can’t get it off my finger. My fingers have swollen from the heat.”

“Can you try?”

I began to tug on the ring, twisting and pulling. It wouldn’t budge. I twisted it some more, finally popping it over my knuckle after a serious stab of pain. “Ouch, that hurt like crazy.” I handed it over to Slash. “What’s your idea?”

“I’m not going to mark you. You’re going to markme—the small round mark of your engagement ring on the inside of my wrist.”

“Wait. You’re okay with that?”

“If it means I can take you home safely, yes.”

I was not in favor of pain in any form, but I could see the possibility here. “Do you think it will work?”

“I have no idea, but if you have any other ideas, I’m open to suggestions.”

I ran through a number of possible scenarios in my head, but couldn’t come up with a better one. “Okay, we can try it.”

Slash handed the shaman my engagement ring. The shaman took it and looked it over with great interest, murmuring something.

“He thinks it’s magic,” Vicente said. “I told him to put it in the fire.”

The rest of the villagers began to chatter and murmur, pressing forward with great interest to see what would happen next. The shaman placed the ring between the tongs and thrust it into the fire. When the ring was glowing, he brought it to Slash. Slash carefully took the tongs and handed them to me.

The entire village gasped at the same time. Slash was right. They’d probably never seen a woman mark a man. This was going to be something the villagers would talk about for a long, long time.

Slash knelt in front of me and calmly held out his wrist. “Well, before I’m forever branded as yours, it seems like I should say something significant to mark our tribal wedding. So, will you, Lexi Carmichael, take me, Slash, aka Nicolo Cilento, aka Romeo Fortuna, as your...tribally wedded husband.”

My hand was shaking so badly, I thought I might drop the ring. So many emotions and thoughts were pinging around inside of me. Had he just asked me to take him as my husband? If I said yes, did it mean we were getting married at exactly this moment in the middle of the rainforest? And how badly would this glowing hot ring hurt him?

I closed my eyes for a few seconds to calm down. One thing at a time. “Yes. Of course, I’ll take all three of you. But I thought I’d be putting a ring on your finger, not burning it into your wrist.”

“When getting married in the Brazilian rainforest, we do as they do. Press it to my skin firmly and count to three. Then lift it off. It’s as easy as that.”

“That doesn’t sound easy, and just so you’re clear, this isnothow I thought our wedding vows would go either.”

“Me neither. But oddly, it seems fitting for us, doesn’t it?”

It did. As he knelt there, staring at me as if I were his whole world, happiness swept through me. It was a kind of happiness I’d never experienced before. This new happiness was a mixture of contentment, love and a surety that I was doing the right thing. Something far beyond an ordinary feeling of gladness. In fact, I’d never thought this kind of joy could happen to me. But somehow Slash had done it. Now here we were, the two of us standing half naked in the middle of the rainforest, professing our love for each other. Not only was it fitting, it felt exactly right.

“It does seem fitting, Slash. Itreallydoes.” Before I lost my nerve, I pressed the glowing ring against the skin on his wrist, watching his expression. His eyes never wavered from mine. I counted to three and pulled the ring off. A small circular welt appeared.

“I’msosorry,” I said. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” He dropped his wrist and took the tongs from me. “I told you it was easy.”