Nancy Morse - Panther On The Prowl

Rennie struggled to awaken, but unconsciousness maintained its tenacious hold, and all she could do was thrash this way and that in a vain attempt to block out the images.

The images faded and returned and faded again until, in the end, she sank even deeper, to a place where there were no memories or images, only a nothingness in which to take refuge.

It could have been minutes, hours or days before she crawled painfully awake out of unconsciousness. There came to her the smell of the damp earth. It seemed somehow familiar, but her mind was hung with moss and cobwebs and was unable to make a connection.

Slowly she became aware of the sounds around her, the hum of insects, a bird’s cry in the distance, and a strange shhh that she could not identify, beckoning her into a state of semiawareness. Uncurling her fingers, she splayed them against the soft fabric on which she lay. Cotton, worn fine by age and cool to the touch.

She did not have to open her eyes to know that she was awake. Yet when she tried to open her eyes, she could not. Was she still dreaming? No, she was sure she was conscious. She could feel a thin ray of sunshine on her face and the dryness in her throat. Why, then, couldn’t she see? Her hands moved cautiously upward, coming to within inches of her face and pausing. She tried with a desperate force of will to tell herself that everything was all right, but when her trembling fingers felt the gauze that covered her eyes, she knew in one great gasping breath that it wasn’t.

A scream welled up within her but no sound emerged as darkness came again like a cold wind, wrapping chilly arms around her and leading her back to unconsciousness.

She had no idea how long she lay there, slipping back and forth from reality to dark dream. In the place in which she hovered, time had no meaning. It could have been day. It could have been night. She didn’t know where she was, or even if she was. For all she knew she was dead, and this was what heaven was like…or hell.

It went on like that until something called her away from the darkness and back to the conscious world. It was the touch of hands working with amazing gentleness to peel the dressing away, hands of mercy applying a soothing compress to the burned skin around her eyes, followed by fresh gauze.

Her voice, unsure and untested, scratched painfully at the back of her throat and emerged as a husky whisper. “Am I in a hospital?”

“No.”

The singular word uttered in a deep pitch that was both unfamiliar and unfriendly made her shudder.

“Wh-where am I?”

“You’re at my place.”

There was no mistaking the inhospitable edge to the voice that spoke, conflicting sharply with the tenderness of the hands that applied fresh gauze to her eyes.

There was a scent about him, of the forest and the damp soil, a scent that Rennie found both comforting for the mother-earth images it conjured up, and frightening with visages of wild things.

She could feel his presence in the very air she breathed, and she wondered how it was possible to be so aware of a man she could not even see.

She drew back, partly out of caution—she had no idea who he was—but mostly from the unanticipated warmth that began at the tips of her fingers and spread clear down to her toes. Appalled at such a reaction at a time like this, she waved his hands away, questioning, “Who are you?”

“My name is John Panther.”

Her mind clouded by the effects of unconsciousness, she echoed, “Panther? Is that some kind of joke?”

“Not that I know of.”

There was a hint of something savage in the deep-throated reply, of wildness and regret and things that Rennie didn’t understand. “I-I’ve never heard a name like that.”

“It’s not so uncommon in these parts.”

“Where are we?”

“In a place called Big Cypress Swamp.”

“Where…?”

“You’re in the Everglades,” he said flatly.

Yes, she remembered now, all that black, wet land stretching for miles in every direction. She began to grow even more afraid. “How long have I been here?”

“Three days.”

She found it hard to imagine that she had been unconscious for three whole days, when it seemed like only moments ago her world exploded.

“Why are my eyes bandaged?”

“They were badly burned. The gauze is necessary to keep the area clean to prevent infection.”

“Are you a doctor?”

“No, but I know a few things about healing with plants and herbs.”

Rennie’s mind struggled to assimilate the information it was receiving and make some sense out of it. Everglades? Plants and herbs? A name like Panther? “What are you?” she asked. “An Indian?”

He answered stoically, “Seminole, to be precise.”

That would explain the essence of something wild that she felt about him, but what was the reason for that inhospitable tone of voice? She sank down onto the mattress…his mattress…his bed. She could smell it now, the scent of the Everglades, the scent of him, lingering on the pillow as her head fell back onto it.

She was scarcely aware of his footsteps retreating to the opposite side of the room, or of the quiet stirrings of his movements as he went about doing whatever it was he was doing. Within minutes he returned. The edge of the bed sank from his weight when he sat down beside her.

“Here. Drink this.”

His hand moved to the back of her head, strong fingers entwining in her hair as he lifted her head and urged a cup to her lips.

Rennie sipped the hot liquid that tasted like tree bark and dirt, and wrinkled her nose. “What are you trying to do, poison me?”

“It’s just an infusion of valerian root to calm you and some local plants to help ease the pain.”

In no time the raw pain around her eyes began to subside and her nerves started to feel a little less frayed around the edges.

The rough, unfriendly voice asked, “Do you remember what happened?”

For all its healing qualities, however, the hot tea could not erase the memory of the accident. She began to cry, the salt of her tears stinging the burned skin beneath the gauze, her shoulders softly shaking.

“It was so horrible. I’ve never been so scared in my life.”

“Well, you’re safe now.”

But Rennie took little comfort in his taut assurance. Safe? From the plane crash, perhaps, but what about what she was running from? She would be a fool to think that Craig would let her get away so easily. He had entirely too much at stake, as he had caustically reminded her that night before she had fled in tears.

“Safe. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Panther.”

“We don’t stand on ceremony here. You can call me John.” Again, that reluctant tone. “And what do I call you?”

Her muscles tensed despite the calming effects of the tea. “My name is Rennie.”

She didn’t want to tell him that Rennie was short for Renata, or that she was the stepdaughter of Trevor Hollander and the runaway finacée of multimillionaire land developer Craig Wolfson, so she used the name her father used to call her, one she hadn’t heard for twenty-five years. She hoped he would not press her to reveal her last name. She’d never been a very good liar, and loathed the thought of having to make one up. His motive for helping her might be different if he knew that she came from a wealthy family, so she reasoned that it was better if he didn’t know who she was and what she was running from.

“Is there anyone I can contact for you?”

“No.” She spoke a little too quickly. Forcing a calm into her voice that she did not feel, she explained, “There’s no one. My parents are deceased, and I have no brothers or sisters.”

It was true, of course. Her impervious mother died a few years ago, her beloved father when she was young enough to feel the impact for the rest of her life, and she was an only child. Nevertheless, she felt as guilty as if she had blatantly lied to him.

Skirting the evasion, she ventured to ask, “Do you know how long it will take for my eyes to heal?”

“The skin around them will heal in a few weeks. As for your sight…only time will tell.”

“Am I…blind?”

“I had a doctor come by to examine you. He’s a Seminole healer from Big Cypress who’s also a licensed physician. He says your blindness is caused by a swelling of the optic nerve. In most cases the swelling eventually subsides and sight is restored.”

Rennie sucked in her breath at his brutal honesty.

“Would you rather I lie to you?” he asked.

No, not another lie. She didn’t think she could stand it. As far as she was concerned, the truth was infinitely preferable under any circumstance because at least it left you with some dignity.

Softly she said, “No lies.”

“In the morning I’ll take you to a hospital. The nearest one’s about fifty miles from here.”

“I would prefer not to go to a hospital.”

She held her breath, praying he would not press the issue and grateful that the bandages hid the fear that must surely be written in her eyes. She’d be crazy to check into a hospital, even under a fictitious name. If Craig found out that her plane went down, he would no doubt give her description to every hospital on the eastern seaboard. She could not take a chance on him finding her, not until she was able to think clearly—when her sight was restored and she could look him in the eyes and tell him what a despicable human being he was, although never seeing him again would also suit her just fine.

“Home, then?” that deep voice asked.

That was the first place Craig would look for her. She shook her head. “I wouldn’t feel comfortable stumbling around in the dark by myself.”

Rennie wasn’t eager to return to the life she left behind, to an overbearing stepfather, a fiancé who deceived her and a world in which the only decision she ever made for herself was the one to study anthropology, much to the displeasure of the senator who had other aspirations for her. Initially her desire to study the past was a way for her to connect with her own lost past, the one that ended with the death of her father. She never expected that she would come to love her work as much as she did, nor that her struggle to reconcile her past would lead her to this place.

“You’ve got to stay somewhere,” he said.

But for Rennie it wasn’t that simple. It had been easy for her to think that Craig was the answer to her self-sufficiency. Easy to imagine herself happily married to a man she now knew would have been as controlling as the senator. Easy to see her mistakes when, because of her blindness, she was unable to see anything else. For now, however, she was grateful for the gauze that sealed her sight, for despite John Panther’s unfriendly tone, she felt safe in his care.

“Couldn’t I stay here?”

She knew by the palpable silence that filled the room that he didn’t like the idea. Inwardly she cringed. Where had she gotten the nerve to ask such a thing? But desperate problems called for desperate solutions and brought out a certain recklessness she didn’t know she had when next she said, “I could pay you.”

He answered with wry annoyance, “With what? Whatever money you had with you is buried beneath the wreckage.”

Another man might have asked how much, and then been slack-jawed when she named a ridiculously high figure. She was no longer afraid to hide her wealthy background, because she also sensed that he was the kind of man who could not be paid off or bargained with.

“It’s just that…” She searched for the words to tell him why she couldn’t go back just yet without revealing things he had no right to know. “I can’t go back. Not yet. Not like this.”