Jinxie's Orchids Read online

  She’d been looking at him. Grinning, Takura got up and went back into the jungle to collect more taro leaves and string bark. Weaving another cord, he attached a denser line of four tightly overlapping leaves to cover her breasts and then wrapped that around her chest, under her arms and tied the ends at her back. Breaking off the stems and tucking the tips of the leaves into her waist, he said, “Be careful when you sit or you’ll break your skirt.”

  Her fingers poked and prodded gently along the seams of her temporary clothes. The skirt barely came down to her knees and her back remained bare, but at least the important parts were covered. She looked a little silly. She also looked sunburnt, freckled and sexy as hell, but that might have been just him.

  “Thank you,” she finally said.

  “Uh huh.” He stepped down into the stream to wash the bark sap off his hands.

  “Wh-what about you? What are you going to wear?”

  “I was born here.” Takura straightened slowly, shaking the excess water from his hands. Turning around, he gave her a full and unobstructed view of what she’d been stealing peeks of mere moments before. “This doesn’t bother me.”

  It took her three long, flaming, jaw-gaping seconds before she clapped a hand over her eyes to shut out the sight, and Takura laughed all the way back up the path to the village.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Brown skin or white, South America or North, a smile was still a smile and laughter seemed universal. Levina had never eaten monkey before. It looked like beef, but tasted almost like pork. The chicken, of course, tasted like chicken, and the abui fruit took a little getting used to. Still, it was without a doubt the best party she’d ever attended.

  Her mother would have been utterly scandalized, and not just because Levina was the only one wearing clothes (albeit clothes made out of jungle leaves). The music was ruckus, mostly drums and pipes and everyone was dancing. The men first, but then the women began to stomp and move along with them. When the sun went down, the bonfire was built up to blazing proportions and a cup of strange alcohol began to circle the group. Everyone took sips and, not wanting to be rude, Levina joined them. Parnell would have had apoplectic fits at the uncivilizedness of it all; Levina was having the time of her life.

  “Go easy on that stuff,” Takura told her when she accepted the cup for the third time.

  Her first sip of the night had been so strong it felt as if it had burned a path all the way down to her stomach. By the third pass around, however, those sips were getting longer and going down as smooth as honeyed tea.

  “It’s very good,” she giggled.

  “Uh huh.” Takura took the cup and would have passed it on, but for Yaolo who urged him to drink as well. Since no one would take the cup until he did, Takura gave in to a small sip.

  Levina pouted a little when the cup wound through the crowd away from her, but then two of the younger women came and grabbed her hands, pulling her into the dance. No maidenly waltz was this. She danced as they danced, stomping circles around the bonfire, kicking up her bare feet and twirling when the others did, and laughing when she almost fell down. She hadn’t laughed like this in a very long time. She couldn’t remember ever having felt so carefree.

  Sitting with the men, now and then she thought she caught Takura watching her, particularly when the cup made its way back into her hands. Dancing was thirsty work. Giggling and breathless, she drank more deeply, watching as Takura separated himself from his companions to come and take the cup away from her again. She watched him approach, her eyes drifting from his shadowed face, down the broad expanse of his naked chest, to his narrow hips and even down into the deeply-shadowed recess between his muscular thighs.

  She flushed hot all over. It was amazing how fast she had gotten used to seeing naked people. Or maybe it was because she was having such a good time. She hardly bothered to drag her eyes up from his…his thing back to his face. Not even when he reached out and snatched the wooden cup from her hand. “Aw!”

  “You’ve had enough, I said.”

  “Don’t be a poor sport,” she chided and tried to take the cup back. He was taller and held it easily out of her reach.

  “You’re getting drunk.”

  “No, I’m not.” She threw her hands in the air and twirled around, the amber glow of the firelight catching on the leaves of her clothes as she laughingly declared, “A lady never drinks to excess!”

  A corner of his mouth smirked up at that. He didn’t look convinced, but she didn’t care. She twirled around and around, losing her balance towards the end. Takura caught her, steadying her on her feet while she laughingly threw her arms around his shoulders, crushing the leaves of her dress between them. Before he knew what she was about, she’d swiped the near empty cup from his hand.

  “All right.” His face took on a whole new level of sternness. He caught her wrist and removed the cup, this time with authority. “I mean it. Enough.”

  “Or what?” she purred, walking two fingers up his arm to play a languid, unapologetic game of tug-o-war with the intoxicant he was striving so hard to keep away from her.

  “You do not want to find out,” he warned, but she began to sway in his arms, pulling him unwillingly into the dance.

  The more she rubbed against him, the more his conviction seemed to waver and his arm lowered. Until, laughter bubbling up inside her, she snatched the cup from his fingertips and spun away from him, prancing in amidst the other women where there was safety in numbers. Maybe. Between the flickering bonfire and the leaping shadows, even with that wry smile twisting at his mouth, Takura was looking dangerous. It was doing strange things to her, making her heart pound in time with the beating drums and sparking the echoing pulse of something else way down in the pit of her belly.

  “Levina,” he said, stalking her from the opposite side of the bonfire. “Am I going to have to put you across my knee, right here in front of all these very nice people?”

  “You men and your two good licks.” Unwilling to be threatened, she laughed instead and stamped her feet, no longer trying to match the other dancers but letting the music and the alcohol move her. She beckoned to him, the pendulum swing of her hips drawing him teasingly closer as she dangled that cup just beyond his reach. The look she gave him as she twirled around was one of pure wantonness and wanting. She smirked. “I’ll give you two good licks.”

  She dashed in then, taking advantage of his surprise to catch the back of his neck and pull him closer. She leaned right into his chest and the tip of her tongue flicked out, tasting him once, then twice, and then she let him go. She danced away laughing, but Takura was no longer smiling. A strange intensity had robbed all other expression from his dark face. No one had ever looked at her like that before; it was exhilarating and a little frightening, and she quickly twirled her way around the other dancers until she had the tall fire between them again.

  Laughing breathlessly, she victoriously drank almost all the remaining alcohol before he managed to grab the cup from her hand. She lost her balance. Had he not caught her arm, she’d have fallen flat on her butt right there in the dirt.

  “Oh!” she cried, stumbling until she regained her balance. It was right there on the tip of her tongue to say things about men who grabbed, but one look at him distracted her completely. “Takura,” she said in surprise. “You’ve tied up your thing!”

  When she pointed helpfully, he looked down at himself. Cursing blackly under his breath, Takura threw back his head and drained every last drop in the cup before tossing it to someone in the crowd. Villagers were laughing at them when he caught Levina by the arm, stopping her from bending down to get a better look.

  “Say goodnight, princess,” he growled as he ducked down and grabbed the backs of her thighs. The whole world spun when he lifted and Levina toppled over his shoulder onto his back.

  Giggling helplessly, Levina braced a hand upon his bare hip and heaved herself up as high as possible. “Goodnight, princess!” She waved to the natives,
most of whom were still gathered around the fire and laughing. She saw a few of them wave back before the dizziness overtook her and Levina collapsed into place against Takura’s bare back again.

  He smelled so—she took a deep breath—masculine. He had such smooth, brown skin, too. Unable to help herself, she stroked the bunching, rippling muscle from his back to his waist.

  “You have a really nice behind.” She heard a snorting sound that might have been muffled laughter. “I probably shouldn’t have said that. Do you think me very forward?”

  “Not at all.”

  The world was starting to spin faster, probably because of the slight jarring motion of each step that carried her away from the party and into the night shadows of the village. “I think I’d like to get down now.”

  She tried to push herself up and off his shoulder, an attempt that met a sudden end when his rough hand clapped hard across the seat of her taro leaf skirt. The leaves did very little to absorb the impact.

  “Oh!” She wiggled and then, lightning fast, smacked him back. Her hand bounced off his firm buttocks, but the ineffective blow easily stung her fingers more than it bothered him. She shook out her smarting hand. “Ow.”

  His chuckle held little real mirth. “Now, you really have asked for this.”

  Carrying her into the nearest hut, he rolled her none-too-gently off his shoulder onto a low hanging hammock. She landed half on and half off.

  “Uh.” She tried to pull her knees up into the netting with the rest of her, but for some reason couldn’t quite figure out which way this hammock was going. It was a position Takura took full advantage of.

  “You just can’t help pushing, can you?” His hand rained three swift, but startling swats all over her helpless rump.

  Yelping and twisting, Levina struggled to roll onto her side. Discovering the floor with both feet, she shoved and kicked and groped, and finally the hammock had enough. It dumped her out, knocking her into Takura. He tried to catch her, but she fell anyway and took him with her.

  Strips of taro went everywhere as they hit the cool dirt floor together, a tangle of limbs and leaves and Levina’s uncontainable laughter. She lay there a long time, flat on her back and giggling while Takura, braced over her on hands and knees, and doing his best not to crush her under him, could only shake his head and smile.

  Eventually, she got her giggles under control. “Hello,” she said softly, walking two wandering fingers up his chest.

  Smiling now himself, he looked down at them, watching them meander their way up to his shoulders. “Yeah,” he said. “You’ve definitely had too much of that stuff.”

  “Nonsense.” She batted that off with an airy swat of her hand. “I’m rain as right.”

  “So I see.” He crawled to his feet. “Come on.” Reaching down to help her up, together they managed to roll her into the hammock the right way. She lay on her back, her shoulders squared against the netting, watching the hut spin. “Takura?”

  “Yeah?” He tried to smooth her leaves down over all the important places, but she was missing a few. The milky curve of her right buttock was exposed, and the rosebud tip of one nipple was playing a dangerous game of peek-a-boo through a gap in her leafy top, a veritable warning shot fired over the bow of his determination to resist this temptation.

  “I could really use another drink.” Her eyelids were growing heavy. Each blink was growing harder and harder to recover from. She could barely bring him fully into focus anymore. She thought he might be smirking again, but she just couldn’t get her eyes to focus enough to tell for sure.

  “It’s been a long day, princess.” His fingers touched her forehead, smoothing away tickling copper curls. “Tomorrow will be even longer. We need to get an early start if you want to reach that flower ahead of your beau.”

  “Mm,” she mumbled, unenthusiastically. She wouldn’t have minded just one more sip. Unfortunately, before she could summon strength enough to pester him to fetch her some, she fell asleep.

  * * * * *

  The morning sun was filtering down through the treetops and through the slits between the bamboo walls before some of the fuzziness retreated from her brain enough for Levina to become aware again. Or at least, aware enough to wonder why her mouth tasted like two day old boot leather or what was prodding at her from behind. Groaning softly, she tried to swallow the taste. It refused to be banished.

  What was poking at her?

  She tried to open her eyes to look, but the effort was just too great. Whatever it was, it felt knobby and hot, smooth and hard all at once, and with every breath she took, it seemed to move ever so slightly, sliding along the inside of her thigh before prodding with startling intimacy back up against her maidenly parts.

  Levina’s eyes snapped open, and suddenly she became very much aware that she was being touched pretty much all over. Everywhere. Oh my goodness, she was…she was spooning! With Takura or with a native, it was hard to tell when all she had to guess by was a length of brown arm lying across her waist. The sun-bronzed forearm dangled down just under her bosom with one large hand cupping her right breast between torn taro leaves. She was all but naked now, her jungle dress having come completely apart sometime in the night. Leaves littered the hammock and the floor beneath her, and only one or two partial pieces remained stubbornly clinging to the bark-woven string draped around her waist and chest.

  “Oh my goodness!” she squeaked, almost afraid to move lest she inadvertently wake whomever up and the situation dissolved from bad to worse.

  Timidly gathering a two-fingered hold on the wrist of that hugging arm, she was just about to attempt an extraction when the warm body behind her shifted. Long brown legs stretched behind her legs and that hot, knobby—oh my God, it was a thing, her brain suddenly clarified—rubbed sinuously full-on up against her as a deep, masculine inhale developed into a yawn right behind her ear.

  Levina erupted out of the hammock dressed in only two twists of bark cord. She grabbed at two large rips of taro leaf, plastering one to her front and the other over her behind, and ran. Two clamped lips muffled her horrified scream as she fled the hut, sprinting as fast as she could across the plateau and back to the stream where, if there was a God in heaven, her clothes would still be waiting for her.

  * * * * *

  Suddenly thrown out of bed, Takura hit the ground with a start. He groaned, reaching up with one hand to grip his head, willing the pounding drums lodged inside his skull to cease. Somehow he managed to pry open one eye just in time to witness Levina’s curvy white backside leaping over a small pile of pots on her way to the river.

  She was looking very native this morning.

  “Mm,” he groaned and rolled onto his back, closing his eyes again.

  Someone in one of the other hammocks hanging throughout the hut giggled, but was promptly shushed.

  He should never have drunk so much chicha. He’d known better. It did this to him every time. Tired, his skull feeling at least two sizes smaller than his brain required, Takura didn’t bother trying to crawl back up into the hammock. He simply tried to sleep.

  Except that—great—now he had to pee.

  The sun was up. It was time to get moving, anyway.

  Rolling himself upright caused a brief but aggravating entanglement with the drooping net of the hammock. The hammock almost won.

  Way too much chicha.

  All through the hut, dark almond eyes were turning his way. There was more giggling as he staggered to his feet. He waved at them with one hand. “Yeah, yeah, yeah.”

  “Ya, ya,” Yaolo echoed, and then cackled as Takura looked down at himself enough to notice that a raging erection was not the worst of his problems.

  “Son of a—” Takura stared in shock at his bright red penis and the symbols drawn all over the flat plane of his belly, up his chest and down his thighs. He craned his head over his shoulder, turning in a full, stumbling circle as he realized they’d even managed to draw on his ass. “You painted me!”r />
  Until that moment when the entire hut erupted into laughter, he hadn’t realized there were that many people awake.

  “Ya, ya. We paint you.” Yaolo slapped his leg, roaring with laughter.

  Takura rubbed at his skin, but the paint refused to smear much less come off.

  “No, no!” Yaolo jumped out of bed to grab Takura’s arm. “Leave on.”

  “See?” Sitting up in her husband’s hammock, Yaolo’s wife pointed to that jutting aspect below his waist. “Good magic.”

  “Tell you wife,” Yaolo said, shooing at him. “She no need flower now. You fixed.”

  “She go you home, good wife now. No more wander.” The native woman lay back down, rubbing her hands over her own belly.

  Getting angry at this point was a really good way to get thrown out of the village, and they still needed to borrow a machete. So Takura held his tongue on all points but that one. “She is not,” he stressed, “my wife.”

  His old friend only smiled and patted his shoulder. “We fix.”

  Takura stared at him, uncomprehending for a moment before a horrible dawning thought began to worm its way through the pounding drumbeats in his head. His hands shot up to rub at his face. He looked at his fingers for any sign of paint, but there was none. He rubbed again, but if his face was equally painted no flecks of it were coming off.

  “Many sons,” Yaolo blessed him, patting his shoulder again. “You, you big woman. Many sons. Big sons.” Cracking another huge grin, the native laughed all over again when Takura took off towards the stream. “Ya, we fix you. Make many big sons!”