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It felt inevitable that something more would happen—needed to happen—between them. He felt the inexorable draw and, rather than fight it, he found himself welcoming it.
Flávia was like no one else he’d ever known. Even here, and now, he knew he’d never meet anyone like her ever again.
They’d even been onto Fabio and Raoul’s tree house with Raoul’s high-tech camera and seen some of the jungle’s nocturnal creatures, including a crab-eating fox, a prehensile-tailed porcupine and a fight between a wandering spider and a raid of army ants.
‘Brady would go mad for this,’ Jake had said in awe.
And so Flávia had given such vivid detail to each and every one of them, things that he could pass on to his sponge-like nephew, that he’d found himself lost in her passion. More and more, he could see what she saw in Brady that he had missed all these months.
It didn’t make him feel good.
Now, lying in his hammock, in the relative dark with nothing but the sounds of the jungle around them, and the crackling of the fire, it felt almost intimate. Raoul and Fabio were close enough for safety but not so close that they could hear any conversation he and Flávia might have.
And right now, he was glad of it, because he was still grappling with the questions running around his head.
‘A penny for your thoughts,’ she said softly. ‘I think that’s the phrase?’
He shouldn’t answer, and yet Jake found himself opening his mouth. As if he was the kind of man who found it that easy to talk.
Except, with Flávia, he was turning into that man. And he couldn’t help but think that it wasn’t a bad thing.
‘I think I’m beginning to understand Brady’s obsess...fascination,’ he corrected, ‘for this stuff. Just like you.’
‘Just like me,’ she concurred quietly.
‘I wouldn’t have seen it, if you hadn’t come along.’
He knew he would never have made the admission back in so-called real life. But here, now, he could say it to the stunning, starry night sky—a sky like none he’d ever seen before. The lack of light pollution, just as Flávia had said.
And he could say it to Flávia.
‘I think you would have.’ He could hear the so
ft smile even in her voice. ‘It just might have taken you a bit longer, and you wouldn’t have known what you were looking for.’
‘I want to believe it. But I’m afraid, in this, that view affords me too much credit.’
‘Then look at it this way. You’ll never have to find out because, fortunately, you do know. Even better, you’re acting on it.’
‘I still don’t know whether to bring him out here.’
‘He’d love it,’ Flávia laughed softly.
‘Oh, he would. No question. But I still don’t know if it’s responsible to bring a seven-year-old into the Atlantic Forest.’
The air went silent, though not still, as Flávia appeared to ponder his question.
‘Many kids, maybe not,’ she offered eventually. ‘Although, they do run mini expeditions from the city and there are kids under ten. But Brady is different. He would really soak it all in.’
‘I know, but—’
‘You’re not his father, but you’re wholly responsible for him,’ she supplied. ‘Which makes the decision that much harder.’
He blew out a deep breath and time passed, but he didn’t know how long.
Maybe a lifetime.
He’d never voiced these fears to anyone before. He didn’t even know he was going to voice them to Flávia, until he heard them coming out of his mouth.
