Page 12 of His Hawaiian Heart
Katrina actually rubbed her palms together like one of those cartoon villains. “This ought to be good!”
“Funny,” I said though I didn’t find an ounce of humor in this situation. “Let fate decide where this is going and perhaps let Samantha know I’m not a bad guy.”
She reached out to pat my arm again. “Since you asked so nicely, I’m going to do you a favor and decline the request.”
When my brow quirked, she smiled. “If I know anything about the females of this species, and I do, then you’ll be thanking me later.”
“How do you figure?”
“Oh, Sam, don’t you know girls find the bad guys the most attractive?”
Before I could respond, she turned and walked away, leaving me truly alone. Well, damn, it seemed like I was going to have to depend on my island knowledge after all to find my way back to the car.
Or else you could man up and walk a bit further and let Sam know you’re not leaving without saying goodbye.
There was that.
Chapter Five
Samantha
On reaching the area set up as temporary lodgings, I pasted a smile on my face and made the obligatory round of greeting those who’d been occupied with something more important than traipsing into the woods to discover me andhimpractically joined at the hip. It was no one’s fault but my own that I’d acted the fool. In fact, come to think of it, I was lucky he hadn’t had time to kiss me.
Don’t you mean hadn’t bothered?
“Shhh!” I hissed beneath my breath as I followed Cookie to the tent serving as the camp’s mess hall. Well, until I walked smack-dab into him as he abruptly came to a stop and lifted his hand.
“Did you hear that?”
“Huh?”
“Hissing, you know like a snake does,” Cookie said.
Why he preferred traipsing all over the world instead of running some five-star restaurant was a mystery I’d yet to solve. I just knew I adored Randolph, the man we all called Cookie as that was what he was known for. Not just for his ability to createincredible meals whether in the middle of a desert or deep in a rainforest, but for actually baking fresh cookies on a daily basis.
“Can’t say I did, but don’t worry. Unlike in Peru, you don’t have to be concerned about anacondas or fer-de-lances here. There are no venomous snakes in Hawaii.”
He gave me a look that bordered on disbelief. “Even so, they’d still have fangs, right?”
I couldn’t argue with his logic and nodded. “Yes, but look at it this way, you won’t have to worry about anacondas hugging you to death or dropping dead in seconds from poison. Even if you get bit a couple of times, you won’t die.”
“Well, aren’t you just a little ray of sunshine,” Cookie grunted.
“Yep, that’s me! Always looking for the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.”
Too bad all you found was a slimy serpent in the grass…
“I thought that was a myth.”
“Maybe you’ve just been looking at the wrong pot.” I added a laugh, only cringing a teensy bit because even to my ears I sounded a trifle hysterical.
“Who’s talking about pots? I’m talking about snakes. Aren’t you brainiacs always spouting off about how snakes aren’t slimy? Or does that only afflict those serpents?”
“Serpents?”
“The ones in the grass.”
Oh shit. Evidently thatsilentvoicehad not only disregarded my request she shut up,she’d decided to speak loud enough for Cookie to hear her.My reputation already had a mark against it, and now I was in danger of having my sanity questioned by talking to myself.
