Page 36 of Knox's Mission

Lorna’s voice caught his attention as it grew louder.

“Can we come in?” she asked. He assumed she meant Donnie was part of thewe. He was surprised when it was Amy instead.

“Where’s your boyfriend?” he asked Lorna, whowas holding onto Amy’s hand like she might run away and leave Lorna alone to fend for herself.

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Lorna said. “And he’s gone.”

Shit.

“What do you mean?” he asked, hoping that he didn’t hear the second part correctly.

“He made me promise not to tell you until this morning, but he took off at some point during the night,” Lorna supplied.

“And you let him?” Knox asked, frustrated.

Lorna shot a look of apology. “I asked him to change his mind. He agreed, so I thought I’d convinced him. We went to sleep and when I woke up he was gone.”

“Is it possible that he’s somewhere around the village?” The village was small but it was easy to stay out of view by ducking on the other side of a hut.

“I asked around and found out that he asked for a day’s supply of fruit,” she said. “Told one of the villagers that he was going out ahead to scout.”

“Is it possible he was telling the truth?”

Lorna shot a look. “I should have known he wasn’t going to agree so easily. I was brain-dead at that point and shouldn’t have believed him. I’m sorry. I came to Amy as fast as I realized what happened.”

“Did he say why he was striking out on his own?” Knox asked. The man had survived just fine afterabandoning Amy. Was this really his first time in the Amazon?

“Said you didn’t know what the hell you were doing and were going to get us all killed,” Lorna stated. “He begged me to come with him before something happened that I won’t recover from.”

Was Donnie blaming Knox for the near drowning in the river?

“I didn’t see him jumping into action when he was needed yesterday,” Knox pointed out. The man was grinding Knox’s gears. He needed to cool it so he could think more clearly. Forcing a calm he didn’t feel because he wanted to wring Donnie’s neck, Knox exhaled. They would travel lighter with three people. He had a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach about Donnie, though. Call it intuition honed by years of military experience, but Donnie would now be perceived as a threat. If they encountered him again, he would be treated as such.

Lorna didn’t respond to his comment. “I can’t believe he would pull something like this. Guess I didn’t know him as well as I believed I did.”

“You can only judge a person by the face they show you,” he said, taking his frustration down a couple of notches.

“We dated for three years,” she said on a slow sigh that was the equivalent of a balloon deflating. “I thought I knew him better than that.”

“We’ll be better off without him,” Knox said, trying to offer reassurance. Based on Lorna’s frown, it backfired. “Which is just to say it’ll be easier to get three of us to safety than four.” He didn’t mention the fact Donnie wasn’t helpful or that he offered nothing more than a sour attitude. Men like him got good soldiers killed on the battlefield.

Then again, so did men like Knox.

More of that guilt and shame assaulted him. He’d been close to Amy last night and not once had it crossed his mind to tell her that he was responsible for Garrett’s death. What kind of asshole did that? He’d sprung out of bed ready and willing to kiss her too. Would that have been the worst kind of betrayal?

She would hate his guts when she found out and he deserved nothing less.

Minimizing the impact would be his best course of action for both of their sakes.

But first, could he get them out of the jungle in one piece? Or would Donnie’s ignorance lead others to them?

If Donnie’s actions weren’t born out of ignorance, he was even more of a threat.

10

Amy walked over to Knox and reached for his hand. He withdrew almost immediately before they made contact. What the hell?

Another wall came up between them. As much as she would probably desire this man for the rest of her life, she couldn’t do this anymore. His village conquest should have been the final straw. He still hadn’t come clean about why she’d been in his hut. Was Amy wearing a ‘fool’ stamp on her forehead, same as Lorna?

---