Page 22 of Uncharted Desires

West smiled. “I’m starving too. What have you been eating?”

“Just the overripe papaya, and I haven’t seen too many of those. I think it’s past their season. We need a fire and a way to fish, or we need to find some nuts or berries. I know nothing about cooking fish though.”

“Your grandmother didn’t teach you anything about cooking?”

Kat laughed. “No, she’s the worst cook ever. Thanks to government subsidies and canned food, a lot of Native communities have poor health and have lived off food from a can or package, especially those like my grandmother who have no familial recipes.”

West looked away from her, taking a great interest in a beetle-looking bug walking across their path. She could sense he was uncomfortable. It was why, as a rule, she kept her heritage to herself, but at least West asked her questions. He may have been uncomfortable, but he still wanted to know more, and for that, Kat was grateful. She lived in a strange in-between world, with no clear sense of belonging. She was adrift in more ways than one.

Was she White, or was she Indigenous? Was she both, and would the world accept her for being both? Would she be able to accept herself? Was she going to be a musician, a singer, a songwriter, or something else? Was she going to fight for others like her, or was she going to escape? The questions continued to swim around in her head all while she should have been worried about finding food, but rather than thinking about eating, or even her future as an Indigenous woman in a White world, all she wanted to think about was West’s perfect mouth, and how it had been so close to being on hers.

“We’re not too far from the beach. I thought if we could catch a fish, we could eat something real.”

“Do you have my knife? I noticed you using it earlier.”

Kat searched the pockets of her pants. “Shit, it’s somewhere around here.” She dropped to where she had been making West’s concoction of herbs for his antivenom, her hands raking across the dirt.

He stopped her, lifting one of her hands closer to his eyes, concern on his face. “What happened to your hands?”

She pulled it back, unwilling to let him get close again. “It’s fine. I just couldn’t get the damn coconut open. Your knife was useless in that regard.”

He picked her hand up again, genuine worry in his eyes. “I’m sorry, Kat, I shouldn’t have left you to fend for yourself. I should have paid attention to where I was stepping and avoided that snake.”

She felt the warmth of his hands as he massaged her raw palms. She forced herself to break away from the mesmerizing sensation before she lost control.

“West, stop. I can take care of myself.”

“Kat. You’re missing the point. You don’t have to. This whole situation is my fault. I do something stupid, and you end up in the crosshairs. Can you please let me take care of you for once? I’m not just a pretty face you know.”

Kat knew he was more than a pretty face. She had always thought so. He was a brilliant musician and singer. He was good with people and was always kind and attentive to his fans, even when they could be overzealous. She didn’t know how he dealt with it so well. He was a good person, just not to her. She had never thought he dealt with insecurities based on his looks.

She saw something silver under some brush and grabbed it, the cool metal soothing her hands.

“Here.” She shoved the knife at West. “You want to do something, catch a fish and figure out how to cook the damn thing because I sure as hell don’t know the first thing about making a fire without a lighter.”

An hour later West had fashioned a stick into a rather impressive spear, but as he had never been spearfishing, he hadn’t caught a fish yet. Kat was sitting on the beach, the setting sun behind her glowed with the brightest reds and oranges. She deserved to be painted right there by Monet or Renault—someone who could capture the beauty not only of the landscape but of the woman within it. She sat on the rocky shore impatiently tapping her foot on the sand, waiting not so patiently for him to catch a fish. Every time he missed he could tell she was struggling to keep her mouth shut.

“You could figure out how to start a fire,” he yelled over his shoulder. He was knee-deep in the water, and even from a distance he could feel her fiery stare on him.

“I don’t know how,” she called back.

“Haven’t you seen a movie? Take a stick and . . .” He took the spear in his hand and rolled it back and forth to simulate making a fire.

The action made him picture her hands gripped around a stick, stroking it back and forth, and it transported his mind to another shaft he’d like to see her stroking.

He had wanted to kiss her earlier, and now he was mad he hadn’t. Fuck, she was pushing him off his equilibrium. He was always in control with women—they threw themselves at him, and he decided if he wanted to make their night. Conceited? Most likely, but the truth. He gave women what they wanted, and they always left satisfied. Except for Gia—she had kept him on his toes, making it interesting enough for him to come back again and again until her tantrums and pouting had lost their charm. Even if their make up sex was fantastic, West knew she wasn’t worth the effort anymore.

Kat couldn’t be more different. She wouldn’t be fake with him; she had already told him more truths about herself than Gia ever had. She was real and raw and all the things he hadn’t realized he had been missing, and he should have kissed her. But he couldn’t shake the feeling that if he crossed that line, there would be no going back for them. Something had ignited within him when his lips had touched hers long ago, and if it happened again, he might not walk away from her this time.

“People don’t start fires like that,” Kat said, walking toward him, dipping her toes into the ocean. She stood still and let the wave pull her feet under the sand.

“Yes, they do.” He just didn’t know how.

She cocked an eyebrow. “Okay, Boy Scout, how?”

“I don’t know . . . it’s friction or something. You need a stick and to get some of that coconut fluff.”

She looked at him with disbelief in her eyes. “Maybe I should try spearfishing.”