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Annie sat within the shelter of the cave, her arms wrapped around her knees, staring into the oncoming night.

Declan had tried to use his satphone, but it hadn’t worked. He’d spent a few minutes pressing buttons and muttering under his breath before he’d tossed the thing aside and turned his attention to lighting a fire with some kindling and what he’d told her was a ferro rod.

She’d had to ask twice before he’d told her what the little tool was called.

Obviously, he was not eager to talk to her.

So be it.

The fire felt good even though he’d built it small. She knew it was to avoid making it visible at a distance. After starting the fire, he’d said he was going to scout the area.

“I’ll be back,” he’d told her.

She’d almost said that Arnold Schwarzenegger had used the same line, but he was gone before she could work up the energy.

Annie sighed.

She was tired, dirty and hungry. But for the first time in months, she felt safe.

Which was, she knew, abjectly ridiculous.

They weren’t safe. They were in deep trouble. Ass-deep in shit, she’d once heard a guy in Declan’s unit say about some mission in the past, and right now she couldn’t think of a more accurate description of their situation.

Men who wanted to capture her and kill Declan were after them. The outlaws who’d kidnapped her? Her uncle? The horrid king he’d sold her to? The terrorist her kidnappers had sold her to?

Annie shuddered.

No. She wasn’t going to think about any of that. Not tonight. She had little doubt that they were all out there somewhere, searching for Declan and her.

Still, she felt… Well, maybe safe wasn’t quite the right word, but it was close enough. The rocky cliff at their backs offered some sense of security. So did the cave. And the fire. There was something wonderfully atavistic about a fire.

All those things were a comfort.

But nothing was as much a comfort as Declan.

All through the endless trip up the mountain, riding behind him with her arms around him, her body pressed to his… She’d been frightened, yes. Terrified. But the feel of him in her arms, the heat of him, the strength…

Annie closed her eyes.

How she’d missed him! She’d dreamed of him at night, thought of him during the day, always wondering what he felt about her, believed about her.

She had never dared imagine seeing him again.

And then the shock of finding he was beside her in that awful shack, hearing his voice, feeling his lips on hers and knowing it was not a dream, that he was real, that he had come to save her…

That he despised her.

A soft whisper of despair rose in her throat.

Of course, he despised her. She’d vanished from his life and when she’d reappeared, it was as someone else, a woman he’d never known before…

“Okay.”

She looked up. Declan stood in the mouth of the cave, water bottles slung over his shoulders, a bunch of reeds and leaves in his arms, and a knotted bandana in one hand.

“We’re good until morning.”

He dumped the reeds and leaves on the cave floor. The floor was relatively smooth, made that way by people and animals over the centuries.