

### Serengeti Serenade Unbuttoned

Anne Knowles

Cover Art by Laura Shinn

Copyright 2012 Anne Knowles

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### Dedication

For my friend

Pat
Chapter 1

I stepped onto the veranda of the Seronera Lodge. Acacia trees, their trunks wrapped in white, hovered in the air like ghostly umbrellas. The few scattered buildings of Seronera were softened in the early morning fog that moved over the Serengeti National Park.

I took a deep breath of the moist, clean air and leaned my elbows on the railing that surrounded the veranda. My robe fell open to the sash. I looked down. "Oops!" Cleavage, breasts, the works. I quickly pulled the robe closed at my neck.

No woman had ever--repeat, ever--experienced as many absent-minded catastrophes with her clothes as I had. From as early as first grade, when I'd forgotten to put on my Tuesday fruit-of-the-looms before walking to school, I'd had a tendency to wander out in public with clothing unbuttoned, unzipped, or forgotten altogether. My mother, a performance artist and kook in her own right, put it down to daydreaming. My grandmother, Victorian and queenly--she said things like _Hush children_ \--put it down to a lack of social graces. My father, a novelist, put it down to the stream of words that filled my mind and left the rational part of my brain inebriated. I loved words and I loved to write.

At any rate, I held my robe closed and listened to the silence on the Serengeti. It was so profound that I was convinced I heard the fog whisper along the ground. I closed my eyes. In the distance, a thunder of hoofs moved into the silence and grew louder and louder. I opened my eyes and the wildebeest came, huge, buffalo-like animals, appearing as if from nowhere, west of the lodge. Their legs nearly invisible in the milky air, they seemed to float by me. I was mesmerized. It was a full fifteen minutes before the last of them disappeared into the fog.

I had turned to go back into my room when I heard a car door slam. A motor rumbled to life. Soon the noise disappeared in the distance.

"Dr. Colin McCullough," I whispered. As principal creative writer for Edwards Production Company, I had been corresponding with Dr. McCullough for months concerning a documentary to be filmed about him and his research on the lions of the Serengeti. "I get up with the sun," he had written in one letter. "And I don't intend to have my schedule disrupted by your film crew."

"Pompous..." I paused. Why bother to pollute the morning with a base anatomical term? "...scientist!" My thoughts were interrupted by a low moan that grew in power and intensity until the air rang with a succession of full-throated roars, coming at two-second intervals. As one series of roars died down, another started, reverberating through the early morning sky and shaking, it seemed to me, the foundations of the earth. At last, as abruptly as it had started, the roaring stopped.

The vast silence once again wrapped around me. The long airplane trip to Nairobi and the dusty bus ride yesterday from there to the village of Seronera had seemed unreal to me. It was the roaring of the lions that told me, emphatically, that I was in the Serengeti.

I hugged my robe to me and returned to my room. My roommate, Randi Coates, was still asleep. With breakfast an hour away, I sat on my bed and opened a large map of the Serengeti National Park. I knew that the lions of the Serengeti couldn't be understood apart from the land, but the last thing in the world I wanted to write was a travelogue. I didn't intend to take the easy way out. I would settle for nothing less than the total involvement of the movie audience.

With my finger, I traced the Mbalageti River as it flowed westward across the National Park to Lake Victoria. From my research, I knew that the thin, black line I traced, in reality, pulsed with life: fever trees and Phoenix palms capturing the sun and handing it down to the river in shafts; baboons frolicking in fig trees; Egyptian geese raucously ka-ka-kaing to one another; pied kingfishers diving time and again for fish; and, of course, the crocodile guarding, as always, the ancient river.

I moved my gaze along the map from Lake Victoria through the western woodlands of the Corridor to the village of Seronera, located in the middle of the park, on the edge of the great eastern plains. As I looked east of the village, I was reminded of words I'd read in my research, something Fritz Jaeger, the first European to see the plains, had written, "And all this a sea of grass, grass, grass, grass and grass. One looks around and sees only grass and sky."

On the map, the words _Olduvai Gorge_ , on the southeast border of the National Park, caught my eye. The gorge had fascinated me ever since a college anthropology class had exposed me to the work of the famous Leakey family, anthropologists who had discovered, in the gorge, fossils millions of years old. The name _Olduvai Gorge_ had come to suggest to me the vast and ancient cycle of life—birth, death, and always the inexorable passage of time.

A small travel alarm buzzed. Randi stirred, reached an arm from under her covers, turned it off, and snuggled back into her pillow.

"Come on, Randi. Rise and shine."

"Jet lag. Five more minutes," she mumbled from under the pile of warm blankets.

"This Dr. McCullough isn't going to put up with lazybones." Randi didn't budge. "You might as well get used to it."

"I'm the business manager," Randi protested. "I probably won't even have to deal with Dr. Early-Riser."

"That's true. But if you don't get up soon, you'll miss breakfast."

That made her sit up, put her feet on the floor, and finally smile. She was a petite, happy woman, loved by the whole crew. She had a head of short, curly, red hair, and, although she wasn't a beautiful woman, her blue eyes sparkled with amusement, no matter what the weather or the state of world affairs. She was ten years older than my twenty-six years, and I treasured our friendship. Ever since I had started working for Edwards Production Company, three years earlier, she'd been a rock of stability in my life.

In no time, Randi had slipped into a pair of jeans and a blouse. "I'm supposed to meet Patch early," she said. "Want me to wait for you?" Patch Whitney was the soundman for the shoot and Randi's fiancé. I told her to go on to breakfast. I'd be there in a minute.

I took a quick shower, rubbed myself dry, pulled my blond hair over one shoulder, and braided it. I slipped on a black thong and a black, lacy bra. I do like thongs and stretchy, lacy bras. I told myself it was because they were cooler, in the temperature sense, but it's the feeling of womanhood that I treasure. It had been three years and six months since my fiancé died. It had been all work, loneliness, and grief since then, and, I don't know, somehow the lacy, thongy garb helped me to remember the feminine me that, at times, I thought had died with him. What I'd wanted to do was wear comfy jeans and baggy t-shirts, hide in a cold garret for the rest of my life, and write depressing novels about death and lost love. So I wore thongs and skimpy, lacy bras as a survival technique.

I glanced at myself in the mirror. Where Randi was petite, I was curvy. I didn't mind being curvy, but sometimes I wished I had Randi's figure. Her tight pants fit neatly across her bottom. I was always worried about too much curvature. And Randi's bosom seemed to contain itself much better than mine did.

Oh, well. "Enough of this, Cinn Wyatt-Jones," I said out loud. I pulled on some blue jeans and a long-sleeved shirt, slipped on my sneakers, and headed out the door for breakfast.

The dining room was nearly full when I entered. Randi was sharing a table with Patch. He was all elbows and knees. If his black thatch of unruly hair hadn't been flecked with gray, he would have looked like a gangly adolescent.

Perry Kellogg, the director, was at a table with four of the technical crew. The table erupted in laughter. That would be Perry, serving up his joke of the day.

"Cinn, over here!"

I saw Howard Edwards, executive producer and owner of Edwards Production Company, at a table beside the large window. Although, at fifty-five years old, Howard had developed a slight paunch, sported a pair of owlish horn-rim glasses, and had only a fringe of gray hair around his head, he had a way with women that was legendary.

I loved the man dearly. He'd hired me just out of graduate school three years earlier solely on the basis of my student writing and one film I'd scripted on the Nebraska prairie dogs. My fiancé had died six months before I was hired, and when my parents died in a car accident only three weeks after I'd started working for him, Howard became as much a father to me as a boss.

"Sit," he said. He pointed to the chair opposite him and took a crunchy bite of toast.

"Good morning to you, too," I said. I poured a cup of coffee from the thermos server on the table.

"Got an email from NASA this morning. They OK'd the use of their film for your opening. Are you going with it or not?"

"Not sure," I replied. I was happy that the option was now available for the opening I'd originally envisioned for the movie. The audience would see first the earth, a blue ball in an immense ocean of black space, then the continent of Africa, then the Serengeti, and finally an acacia tree, sheltering a pride of lions. "I don't dislike it, but I don't know. There's something more here than Universe-Africa-Serengeti-Lion."

"And?"

"I don't know, yet."

"Answers, Cinn. Are you giving up your original idea?"

"Not sure."

"NASA?"

"Tell them maybe."

"I can't tell them maybe." He took off his glasses and cleaned them with his napkin. "You've had months to think about this."

"But I just got here last night."

He put on his glasses and looked intently at me. "Magic. Right?"

"Magic. Stall them." I stood up, went to the window for a plate of eggs and toast, and returned to Howard's table just as Randi walked up.

"Howard, I'm on my way to the office. I have the Land Rover lease papers for you to sign whenever you're finished with breakfast."

"I'm finished," he said as he gulped the last of his coffee and stood up from the table. "Twenty-four hours, Cinn," he said. Not waiting for a response, he followed Randi out of the room.

I gazed out the window at the land that stretched endlessly before my eyes. The sun sparkled in the dewdrops that covered the carpet of gently waving green grass. In the distance, I saw the slopes of Nyaraswiga Hill, lavender in the early morning light. I had the whole morning before we had our first meeting with Dr. McCullough after lunch. I wanted to get out into the Serengeti. I wanted to climb that hill and have a look around.

I finished my breakfast, drank the last of my coffee, and hurried back to my room. Because the morning was warming up, I thought I'd take the time to put on something cooler.

The room telephone rang as I opened the door to my room. "Howard here. McCullough just radioed and is moving the meeting up to 11:00 this morning."

Whoa! Bye-bye to two of my hours. I, of course, told Howard I'd be there, but I refused to give up my plan to hike out to the rocky hill. I surrendered to my in-a-hurry frame of mind, stripped off my jeans and long sleeve shirt, grabbed a pair of cool, loose, white linen shorts--forgot the belt—and a loose white shirt that was cropped at the waist. I put on my hiking boots, grabbed my messenger bag, and out I went.

I headed toward the hill, known in the Serengeti as a kopje. I breathed deeply of the morning air and felt absolutely alive. Behind me, to the east, the land was all grass. To the west, the direction I was walking, the acacia trees broke the horizontal flatness. The rock kopje rose before me like an invitation to anyone who might want to climb above the plains, to see the Serengeti as a whole.

Because of the meeting time change, I walked quickly. Halfway to the kopje, I stopped briefly to rest. I put my hands on my knees and took a couple of deep breaths. Oops! That was twice today, and it was still morning. The white linen shorts I'd grabbed were see-through, maybe not totally, but definitely slightly, see-through. Yep, there it was, my black thong peeking through like an adolescent fantasy. I straightened up and put my hands on my hips. Oops! Again! My beltless shorts hung low on my hips, not low enough to do the plumber's crack thing, but low enough for the strap of Ms. Thongy to show its sweet self to the world above the waist line of the pants. And I'm not going to mention the black, lacy bra under the linen shirt. First grade all over again. I, however, wasn't going to turn back, not until I'd climbed the kopje and felt the Serengeti all through me like a song.

Of course, I'd forgotten my hat. By the time I reached the kopje, I felt a light-headed. The sun was hot, but I was determined to climb anyway. I didn't want to disturb the silence, so I climbed as quietly as possible. I paused, now and then, to look out over the plains. At one point I saw, far in the distance, a herd of giraffe, their long necks dipping gracefully. Closer to the hill, zebra and gazelle grazed.

The kopje was mainly a splash of browns and tans, but I also saw the green, fleshy leaves of the aloe nestled between rocks, and the crimson red of an unfamiliar flower that grew in the moist niches. I sat on a rock and pulled a small plant and animal guidebook from my messenger bag. The book identified the red flower as a _Gloriosa_ lily. Perfect name! The flower, whose brilliant red was incongruous with the subdued browns of the hill, was indeed glorious. A small movement on a rock startled me. A blue and orange lizard darted away. My guidebook said it was an _Agama_ lizard.

All these smaller forms of life were part of the Serengeti, part of the lion's world. Maybe, in the beginning of the movie, the camera could focus on pure, crimson red, then pull back to reveal the _Gloriosa_ lily tucked in a rocky niche on a hill in the Serengeti. I loved the idea, stood up, and turned to hike to the top of the rocky hill.

A snarl and I froze. No more than ten feet from me, a lion stood up from where he'd been resting. I saw every hair in the massive, brown mane that circled his head. The pupils of his yellow eyes constricted. I'd startled him out of sleep, and my heart stopped.
Chapter 2

The lion took a step back. He didn't move a muscle. Neither did I. From somewhere deep inside, a memory screamed at me, something I'd read, maybe something Dr. McCullough had written in one of his letters. "Don't run from a lion unless you want to become its prey." So I played freeze-tag with the lion and fought back an overwhelming urge to run for my life.

The lion flicked the tip of his tail. Small beads of perspiration ran down my forehead and into my eyes. Salty. Tears welled, but I didn't dare wipe my eyes.

Clap! Clap! Clap! The lion tensed and darted away down the back of the hill. I let out my breath. My knees did the earthquake thing, and I collapsed on the ground. I tried desperately to catch my breath.

A shadow moved over me blocking out the sun. OK, I admit it. I screamed. I thought the lion had come back for me. I looked up, however, not into the searing, yellow eyes of the lion, but into the hazel eyes of a tall, muscular man, tanned golden by the sun. He wore khaki hiking shorts and a khaki shirt rolled above his elbows. His legs and arms were hard and firm. So were his eyes. He didn't say a word. He reached a hand down and caught me under the arm. Effortlessly, he lifted me to my feet.

I tried to speak, to thank him, but my mouth was bone-dry. The temblor hit my knees again. I felt myself begin to fall, but the man pulled me to him, his strong arms around my waist. He half-carried me to a rock jutting out beneath the shade of an acacia tree, sat me down, and towered silently in front of me.

I licked my lips. "Thank you."

"Never climb a kopje unless you've scared away the lions."

"What?"

"A kopje, what you were climbing, where you could have been killed."

"I know what a kopje is." Whoa! Did I just use what my grandmother called a petulant tone? I licked my lips again and called up my professional writer's tone. "I researched..."

"Why are you out walking like this, alone, when you have no knowledge of the Serengeti?" His question was not rhetorical.

"I do have some knowledge of the Serengeti. I researched..."

"Not enough to stay alive. If I hadn't spotted you on the kopje from my Land Rover, you'd be lion's meat at this moment." I shuddered involuntarily. "A lion won't bother you unless you insist on walking onto his tongue." He paused. "I saw that male come up here early this morning. You were headed for his favorite spot."

"Oh." Lame, I know, but that's all I could muster up at the moment. I lowered my head. It was like being put in preschool time-out. How could I have been so stupid? After all the research I'd done on the Serengeti, I'd forgotten to use basic common sense. "I'm sorry. I didn't think."

"Damn right you didn't. You risked both our lives."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry. Be sensible." He pulled me to my feet. "Come on. I'll take you back to the village."

"I can walk." The Oxford English Dictionary didn't contain enough words to explain how anxious I was to get away from this man.

His grip tightened on my arm. He set his hat on my head, and I knew I was stuck with him. "And wear a hat next time."

"I was in a hurry. I forgot."

"Don't forget."

I started down the hill in front of him. My knees were still after-shocking, and my former lack of a hat continued to make me light-headed. Dizziness trumped my balance. I stumbled. He reached and just managed to grab the waistband of my pants before I fell. Waistband plus Ms. Thongy.

"I've got you," he said. He did indeed. "Watch your step."

His grip kept me more or less steady. That was a positive, but then, it just seemed to get embarrassing. "I'm really OK," I said over my shoulder. "You can let go."

"And have you break a leg. This is a whole lot easier than slinging you over my shoulder, Lionbait. You just keep walking."

Lionbait? Lionbait! "Look, don't call me..."

"Just keep walking."

Why hadn't I worn a hat? Why hadn't I paid attention, as my mother, grandmother, father, and high school friends said I should, when I participated in the world of putting on my clothes. I stepped down off a rock, my weak knees gave way, and I started to tumble forward again. This time my handler almost lost his grip on my pants and pulled me back hard just in time.

"Jesus," he said under his breath. And then, kill-me-now, I felt him twist his index and middle fingers around the strap of Ms. Thongy. There's me, walking ahead of a stranger with my pants and the strap of my thong secured in his hand. He took a tighter grip and off we went again.

The next time I stumbled, he tugged up hard to keep me from falling, and YIKES! Ms. Thongy, bless her heart, slipped up into the downtown of my anatomy.

My inner volcano jolted awake in a millionth of a nanosecond! This tall, tanned, muscular man who saved my life may not ever be aware of it, but step-by-step down the rocks of the kopje, my dear, sweet volcano rumbled and tumbled and built up pressure. About ten feet from the bottom of the hill, a certain uneven rock and a stumble on my part, and a sharp, hard tug this man gave me in back to hold me steady, and BANG--Vesuvius all the way to the tips of my fingers and toes. It was all I could do to continue down the hill to the flatness of the Serengeti grassland. He finally let go. I summoned nonchalance, focused my eyes on his Land Rover, and made myself continue forward motion.

At his Land Rover, he opened the door for me. "Thank you," I said.

"My pleasure," he replied. I could tell he was trying hard to hold back a grin.

Romeo or rogue? I'm ashamed to admit that it didn't matter to me which one he was. Yes, I had been embarrassed, but I'd never enjoyed a hike down a hill as much as I'd enjoyed that one. And if I were to be completely honest here, I had a brief, but silent, _Ah shucks!_ moment when he untwisted his fingers from the back strap of Ms. Thongy and let go.

He took my elbow and helped me into the Land Rover. I, of course, was horrifyingly aware of my black thong, my slightly, but not entirely, see-through, loose, linen, white shorts, and of the fact that he was behind me, and my bottom smack-dab centered in his line of sight. Jeez Louise! And don't forget the thong straps,tugged up tighter than they were when I'd so innocently started out from the lodge, and me with a loose shirt cropped at the waist. How in the hell did I get myself into these situations?

He climbed in the Rover on the driver's side, and, before he had a chance to put the key in the ignition, I asked, "Who are you?"

He turned to me. "Dr. Colin McCullough." Holy shiatsu (a form of acupressure and a perfectly fine use of the word) on a Shih Tzu! I mean really!! Holy freaking shiatsu on a Shih Tzu! My guy. My scientist. He looked me straight in the eyes. "And who are you?"

"C.S. Wyatt-Jones."

He nodded. He couldn't keep the grin down this time. "I've been corresponding with C.S. Wyatt-Jones." He paused for a long second, and then made a matter-of-fact statement. "You're not a guy."

"Apparently not," I said, defensively on purpose.

"Definitely not," he said. His eyes lowered (consciously? unconsciously? Who knew?) to my lap and my ever-loyal Ms. Thongy. I got a little tingly because, as you remember, Ms. Thongy had been positioned UP by a couple of hard tugs to keep me from breaking a leg. I mean, it's not like there's a dressing room at the foot of the kopje where I can privately readjust my undies. It was a brief lowering of the eyes, I'll grant that, and I think he might have thought he was being impolite because he quickly raised his eyes. But then, impoliteness grabbed hold of him again, and his eyes paused, a bit longer than briefly, at the skimpy, black bra slightly visible through my loose white, linen shirt. My ladies must have enjoyed the attention because I was positive they swelled above the bra line more than ediquette dictated. I looked down quickly at myself. Jeez! Were they really popping out that much above the bra line? Being my grandmother's granddaughter, I flushed furiously. And there was his grin again.

Finally he had the courtesy to meet my eyes. "What does the C.S. stand for?"

"I'm not going to tell you." And I wasn't either.

"So what do I call you for the next two months?"

"Everyone just calls me Cinn."

He laughed out loud. "Sin? S.I.N.?"

"C. I. N. N. Cinn."

"I like both spellings."

In my mind, I came up with a teenage _Whatever!_ but I said not a word. On our way back to Seronera, I'll admit my eyes roamed too. After my inner volcano surprise on the kopje, I couldn't help noticing the strength of Dr. McCullough's tanned leg muscles as he worked the clutch and accelerator of the Land Rover. His khaki shorts pulled tightly against his thighs and against his—how should I say this with the appropriate social graces my grandmother would expect of me—his beast. Nope, that doesn't work. Not even for a writer. Too explicit with too many unwanted overtones. So I'll just say that It (note the capital I) was quite definitely there, and I couldn't be sure if Dr. McCullough's experience with Ms Thongy had given It an increased presence or if It was sleeping. And if It were sleeping, holy karaoke in hurricane!

After parking the Land Rover in front of a cabin farthest from the lodge, Dr. McCullough reached over the seat for his notebook. I climbed out before he could come around and open the door for me, independent professional that I am. I pulled my shorts up and tried to hug them to my waist with my elbow while I reached in back for my messenger bag.

He looked at me over the Land Rover. "You'll have to excuse me. I have a meeting with you in a few minutes, and I want to grab a cup of coffee."

"And you'll have to excuse me. I have a meeting with you in a few minutes and need to...well...I'll see you soon." I almost said, "Change my clothes," but I didn't, and I'd like to receive some extra credit for that.

He turned and stepped up on his porch. I watched until he'd walked in his front door and closed it behind him. I stared at the door a moment, finally shook my head, and turned around to walk up to my room at the lodge, tugging up my pants, unable to believe that things had gotten off to such an amateurish, but, secretly delicious, start.

Dr. Colin McCullough would know who I was soon enough. I'd done an enormous amount of research on the Serengeti. My lack of common sense on the kopje would be forgotten--hope hope hope--and he would come to respect me in my profession as I already respected him in his.

I hurried to my room. I was anxious to write down my new ideas for the movie's opening scenes. Before I knew it, it was 10:59. Meeting in one minute. I was going to be late. Dr. Colin McCullough didn't like latecomers. I closed my laptop, started out the door, and realized I hadn't changed. I pulled off the linen shorts, pulled on a pair of khakis, buttoned them, and hurried out the door. This time Ms. Thongy was well hidden. I don't need to remind you about the black bra and the loose, white, linen blouse. Yep, forgot to change the blouse.
Chapter 3

I reached Dr. McCullough's cabin at a trot. Howard, Patch, and Perry were already on the porch with him. Howard turned to introduce me as I walked up the steps. "And this is C.S. Wyatt-Jones, my head writer. You couldn't ask for a better writer. She's already won two awards for a film she scripted on the Nebraska prairie dogs. She's a natural. In fact, this project was her idea in the first place."

Colin extended a hand to me. "We've already met, informally, over a morning lion. Nice to meet you formally, Cinn." He glanced down, grinned, looked me in the eyes, and nodded toward the zipper of my khaki pants. It was down. With dignity (and an attitude) I refused to turn my back to him I held his gaze and zipped up. He didn't miss a beat. "So this is all your idea?"

"Yes. I read about your work and..."

Colin interrupted. He did that a lot. It was irritating. My grandmother would say it was impolite. My mother would say, "Let be what is." And my father would say to focus on not being the one to interrupt. As I was saying, Colin interrupted, "Reading and being here are two different things, Lionbait. I think you learned that this morning." He turned away from me and motioned us toward a circle of rattan chairs at the end of the porch. "Let's get this meeting started, so I can get back to work."

Now I was getting irritated. I took a chair near the veranda railing. My thoughts were on two things. First, when I had looked down at my zipper, I realized I hadn't changed the loose, slightly see-through, linen shirt, and the ladies were still showing off above their black bra line. Second, I decided to adopt a mantra that had popped into my head like a survival kit jack-in-the-box: _Don't you dare discount me, mister._

I opened my notebook and was about the speak when McCullough cut in, "I agreed to do this film because the agency that funds my research requires that I accommodate film crews, reporters, or photographers who wish to publicize my research. The more publicity the research gets, the more money is donated to the agency. I understand their reasoning..." He turned his hazel eyes and stared into mine, "...but I don't like it." He paused and crossed his arms over his chest. "I know you're excited about this film. I'm not. I'm sorry you're here, and I'm sorry that my research funding requires that I accommodate you."

The silence on the veranda was broken by the distant, muted roaring of a lion. McCullough turned to Howard. "I explained to Wyatt-Jones in my letters that I was not anxious to have a film crew spend two months in the field with me. I was hoping you would find another project, with a researcher more receptive."

My turn. "I didn't want another project with another researcher, Dr. McCullough. You're the best in your field. I wanted you."

Perry, always the reconciler, interceded, "We'll try our best to be as invisible as possible."

Colin spoke evenly, "There are other highly competent scientists. I sent you their emails. I suggested you contact..."

"I wanted you." I carried my interruption off without a hitch.

Colin stared--and there's only one word for it--daggers at me. I saw his lips tighten into a hard line. "Making movies is not important to me. Studying lions is. If you..."

"Getting to know lions is important to us, too. But when we get to know them, we want to put it on film for other people, people who aren't fortunate enough to come to the Serengeti."

Colin looked coolly at me. "If getting a good camera angle gets in the way of my research, I won't help you get the shot."

"We'll worry about the camera angles, Dr. McCullough," I was hot. "You worry about the lions." I clamped my mouth shut and managed to stifle myself before the following came out: "You arrogant son of a bitch." Didn't say it and I'm proud of myself. I wanted to say it. I'd been working on the project for six months, twelve to fourteen hours a day. And there he sat, refusing to acknowledge the validity of my work. Be calm. Be professional. "Dr. McCullough," (Oh, how tightly formal my voice was!) "I want to film that lion beneath the acacia tree on the kopje. What are the chances of catching him there again?"

"Relatively good. He likes that spot. No promises, though."

"I'm not looking for promises."

"What's cooking, Cinn?" asked Perry, leaning forward in his seat.

"I'm thinking of starting the movie with the camera focused on pure crimson red, a close shot of the _Gloriosa lily_. I saw it on the kopje this morning. Then the camera pulls back to a full shot of the lily, with a blurred blue and orange movement in the background. It focuses onto the movement of the _Agama_ lizard, then pulls back from both the lily and the lizard to a shot of that lion, resting beneath the acacia tree, surveying the Serengeti. The camera angle changes, so that the audience sees what the lion sees. Over the image of the land, the title rolls by, _The Song of the Serengeti_.

"You do know a thing or two, don't you," Dr. McCullough said. His eyes didn't immediately meet mine. I noticed they had drifted down to the ladies. Was he aware that his eyes misbehaved constantly?

"I wasn't out there just to prepare dinner for some lion," I shot back. I immediately regretted my words. Why did I keep trying to alienate the man I had to work with for the next two months?

Patch said, "We'll be outfitted by tomorrow morning. Our Land Rovers arrived an hour ago and the technical crew is already putting in the equipment we'll need in the field. We'll be ready to film by tomorrow."

"You received my tentative schedule?" asked Colin.

"We have it."

"It could change at any time. It depends on the lions."

"We can adapt. We're here for the lions, too," I said, hoping Dr. McCullough would catch the tone of total niceness in my voice. Gotta work with the guy, you know.

He didn't. "You're here to film a movie."

That was it. I snapped. "You're right, Dr. McCullough. And it's not _Dick and Jane Meet Leo the Lion_."

Howard, Perry, and Patch tried hard not to laugh, but McCullough's rugged features were unyielding. "If you want to get a lay of the land, I'm going out at 4:30 this afternoon." His voice dared me.

"I'll be here at 4:30 on the dot."

"I'll leave without you if you're not."

"Of course, you will." I deliberately turned away from him. "Howard, I'm finished here."

"I want more information about that opening before you leave this afternoon, so I can work up a plan of attack with the tech crew," Perry said.

"I'll be working in the dining room," I said. "I need a cup of coffee." I turned to Dr. McCullough and formally offered him my hand. "It certainly has been a pleasure, Dr. McCullough. I look forward to working with you."

He stood and gripped my hand with both of his. Warmth. Softness. That grip. "Likewise, Ms. Wyatt-Jones." I could read the sarcasm in his eyes. I could also see those hazel eyes of his lower again to the ladies. I really did need to remember to get rid of the white linen shirt. I let go of his hand, turned, walked down the steps of the veranda, and started up the path to the lodge. I knew I deserved his sarcasm. That was exactly what I'd given him.

And I shouldn't kid myself. I'd known how he felt from the first time he'd responded to my enquiries. He acknowledged the validity of the publicity, but didn't want to "eat, sleep, and work with a bunch of LA crazies," as he had written in one of his letters. He didn't want to do the movie and he hadn't beaten around the bush about it. And I had to admit that I might have purposely forced him into it. I certainly had known about the requirements of his funding agency, and I'd played that card in one of my emails.

But I also knew, from the first time I'd read about his work, that it was Dr. Colin McCullough who would lead me to the essence of the lion. I had purposefully blinded myself to his unwillingness, and I had vigorously pursued the project, grateful that his agency required his cooperation.

I returned to my room first, to change into a tank top that nobody could see through. Then I went to the dining room. I poured myself a cup of coffee at one of the large urns and sat at one of the big tables by the window where Perry and Howard could join me later.

I took a bracing sip of coffee. A war raged inside me. The writer in me was anxious for 4:30 to arrive, to see the land and the lions as Dr. McCullough saw them. But the twenty-six year old woman who had buried herself in writing because of grief over her fiance and her parents, was not looking forward to spending time with the man who had walked Ms. Thongy down the kopje.
Chapter 4

"The Serengeti is a hard land," Colin said as he started the Land Rover. "Most of the animals die a violent death." He glanced at me. Nothing to see through here, I thought. He backed the Land Rover away from his cabin and turned onto the road.

"Most people couldn't survive here," he continued. "That's why it's not spoiled by human foolishness." I knew that he included me and the rest of the movie company in what he called "human foolishness." Arrogant son of a...Ah, forget it.

His voice became formal, almost professorial. "It wasn't until around 1929 that the nine-hundred square miles around Seronera were made a game reserve and the national park wasn't established until 1940." I didn't respond. He looked at me. "I suppose you know all that from your months and months of research."

"I do." I refused to bite back at him, hoping to establish at least a minimally pleasant working relationship. He turned his eyes back to the road. The breeze through the open window ruffled his hair. He had changed from his khaki shorts to a pair of faded jeans that hugged his muscular legs as he drove. And he wore a black t-shirt. Oh, I'll admit that there was something about him. I'll even admit that my eyes strayed (no angel here!) to his lap. Private thought here, totally off the subject of the Serengeti and lions. If It were asleep, what would It be like awake? Jeez, Louise, and Diogenes, too.

When I realized he was done with the lecture, I looked out my window. Despite the fact that Dr. McCullough had proven to be even more irascible than his letters had indicated, I was excited that filming would begin soon, that the documentary I'd worked on for so long would become a reality. We drove a long time in silence, but I didn't mind. There was a lot to see, a lot to think about.

Colin slowed the Land Rover when we came upon two giraffes, nibbling the top leaves of an acacia tree. Their necks were stately as they stretched to pull the leaves into their mouths. Their tawny coats caught the afternoon sun, and their purple shadows seemed to follow the endless, yellow-green grass of the Serengeti to the far horizon.

"Oh," I whispered involuntarily.

McCullough seemed not to hear. "It's rare for the land to retain its ancient personality, as the Serengeti has," he said. After a long silence he looked at me. He pointed to a herd of gazelle and zebra in the distance. "Some of those animals will be stalked tonight and killed." Was he challenging me?

"I know. We plan to film that, too."

Colin stepped on the accelerator and drove past the giraffes. "What about the cubs that are killed when a new group of males takes over a pride?"

What did he want me to say? "I know that happens."

"And will you show it in living color?" He paused. "What about the old lion, kicked out of a pride but too weak to hunt for himself. Do you plan to film his starvation?"

I opened my mouth to speak, but felt a lump in my throat. I looked out the window to gather my thoughts. "We plan to film everything." I looked at him. Knowing he hadn't heard I repeated, "We plan to film everything."

Colin looked into my eyes. "Then you'll have your audience in tears."

"Tears won't hurt the audience."

'How do you avoid haunting them?"

"I don't know."

Colin looked at me for a moment and then turned back to the road. We drove mile after mile through the grassy plain. I closed my eyes. I pictured the lion I had seen that morning on the kopje, saw the earth swimming in an ocean of black space, and the crimson lily...

"Over there." Dr. McCullough touched my shoulder and pointed. I couldn't miss the excitement in his voice. "Under that acacia tree."

I saw a group of lions, motionless in their laziness, reclining in the shade of the tree. "That's the Leo pride," Colin said. "There are two prides in the area around Seronera, each with its own territory, of course. I call them the Leo pride and the Acacia pride. In all, I'm observing four prides within a 125 square mile range. I suppose you know that from your months and months of research."

"Of course." I threw sarcasm at him like a spitball.

"You do know what a pride is, don't you."

"A group of lions," I said sharply. "Look, can we quit this? I'm here and you're going to just have to deal with it. Get off my back."

"A _lasting_ group of lions."

"Thank you for the word _lasting_. It never would have occurred to me."

Colin didn't quit. "The females are all related. The males are related to each other, but not to the females. They stay in the pride as long as they are strong enough to keep out other males."

I was more than willing to be taught by Dr. McCullough, but I wished he'd drop the patronizing tone. He reached into the back of the Land Rover for his notebook, and I noticed the intensity on his face. He was a consummate scientist, the world's leading authority on lions, and despite the antagonism he directed my way, I was certain I had been correct in insisting that he and his work be the subject of the documentary.

I was captivated by the antics of two cubs. Indifferent to the sleeping adults, they clambered over their mother, bit at her ears, and slid down her flanks. Then, they took turns stalking and jumping on her tail. I laughed out loud when one of the cubs tried to hide behind the tuft of his mother's tail and got swiped in the face with it. The other cub jumped on him, and they rolled and tumbled in the grass. Colin looked up briefly when I laughed. He returned to his notebook. I looked back at the cubs.

We sat so long in silence that McCullough's voice startled me when he finally spoke. "All the movement you'll get out of these lions during the day is a flick of an ear, or a step or two as they follow the shade of the tree. Maybe the cubs will wrestle, like today, maybe not."

"We're prepared for that," I said, and I was trying really, really hard to keep my voice professional (My tenth grade English teacher taught me never to write _really, really_ in my essays, but it works well here.) "I'm aware that they hunt mostly at night."

"From your months and months of research, Lionbait?"

Deep breath. Speak calmly. "Yes, but I'm sure I could learn a lot from you."

"I'm sure you could." He held my eyes for a moment and looked down at his notebook.

I opened my mouth to snap at him. I shut my mouth just in time. No matter what kind of attempt I made at establishing a working relationship, he refused to acknowledge my work. But a bad temper on my part certainly wouldn't help the situation.

I sighed and turned back to watch the lions. And as I sat there, I began to feel a natural rhythm to the flicking tails and ears and to the occasional lumbering steps as the lions followed the shade of the tree. The longer I watched, the more I felt the rhythm. In a flash, I knew how to film the lions at rest, and I knew Howard and Perry would love the idea.

"Would it be possible to build a small platform in the tree?" I asked. "For a remote camera." Colin didn't respond, so I continued, "I want to film the lions resting, but I don't want to disturb them."

"It's possible. I doubt it will disturb the lions, but you have no guarantee that any lions will rest there during the next two months."

"I'll take my chances." I glanced down at the notebook on Colin's lap. "What are you doing?"

"I'm studying the relationship between the facial expressions of lions at play and when they are hunting or fighting. It's part of a larger study concerning the role of the social structure in a cub's life as he learns to hunt and protect territory."

He went back to his observations. I turned to watch the lions. Daylight turned to dusk and dusk turned to darkness. I reached into the back for my jacket and pulled it on.

And in the darkness of the African night, I saw my first killing. Colin said the zebra was obviously old and lame, but the age and the limp had been imperceptible to me. All I had seen in the glare of the Land Rover's headlights was the flash of tawny bodies as three lionesses pulled down the zebra.

The killing had been difficult to watch, but I had known it would have to be part of the movie. I'd mentally prepared myself for it before I'd even left the United States. What haunted me, as the Land Rover headed back toward Seronera, was the sight of a lioness, standing beside the kill, unable to eat, its jaw hanging slack, grotesquely misshapen.

Colin told me it was the lioness I'd been watching all afternoon, the mother of the two cubs, that her jaw was broken, kicked by the zebra as it went down. "She'll starve," he said matter-of-factly, as he recorded the pertinent facts of the zebra-kill in his notebook. "And so will the cubs."

The hum of the Land Rover's motor, as we drove through the black night towards the village, blocked out the world. I turned inside myself. All my research hadn't prepared me for that kind of reality. As I watched the headlights pick out a dusty path along the road, I knew that Dr. McCullough had been right. I could never show an audience a sight like that lioness without haunting them. But I had to. I had to because that was the truth of the Serengeti.
Chapter 5

Colin pulled the Land Rover in front of his cabin. My head was throbbing. I didn't know if it was jet-lag, or lack of sleep, or the intensity of what I'd seen on the Serengeti. I fumbled with the handle of the door until Colin came around to open it for me.

"Thank you." My voice sounded thin. I started to step out by myself, but Dr. McCullough's hand was on my elbow before I knew it. I took a deep, bracing breath of the night air.

"Well..." I said as I looked up into his rugged face. His thick lashes half covered his hazel eyes and something—the light of the moon, the time of night—gave them a soft, sensual look. The night breeze ruffled his sandy hair. The breadth of his shoulders filled my vision.

"Well..." I repeated. I looked down at the ground. "I'll be going back to my room, now. Thank you again." I was mumbling. I didn't want to mumble. I turned toward the path, but Colin held on to my elbow and pulled me back toward him.

"You haven't had anything to eat for hours. Come on in. I'll fix us sandwiches. Peanut butter."

I hadn't even thought of eating when we'd been out with the lions, and I knew I had nothing back in my room. I let him lead me up the steps. I wanted to protest that I wasn't hungry, but I was. And I was a bit light-headed and my head ached. And the verbal part of my brain had stopped working.

I finally managed a weak, "Oh, I'm OK."

"Don't argue with me. You know you won't win." Yeah, I knew that. He opened the door, let go of my arm, and ushered me inside. "Wait by the door. I'll light the lantern. The generator only produces electricity until 11:00 at night. We're on our own now." The lantern created a glow that was as inviting as it was cozy. The room was so snug that the vastness of the plains and the struggle for life that went on there seemed on another planet altogether.

"Have a seat," Colin said, pointing to a couch. I sank gratefully into the softness of the couch and watched the darkened kitchen brighten as Colin lit the lantern in there. In a few minutes he returned, balancing two beers in one hand and the sandwiches in the other.

"Peanut butter and jelly," he said. He sat beside me. "Not Hollywood gourmet, but eat it anyway."

I was too exhausted to snap at him. "I grew up on peanut butter and jelly."

"Me, too," said Colin as he popped open a beer and handed it to me.

I took a long, cool drink. Oh my, it was good. I settled back on the couch, ignored my sandwich, and took another drink. I could feel myself unwind. Opposite the couch I noticed a desk, stacked with papers and journals. Beside the desk was a door. The bedroom. I thought briefly of Ms. Thongy's experience, flushed, took another sip of beer, looked again, noticed the bed, got hot on the back of my neck, took another sip, and made myself look away. Next to the couch was a large, over-stuffed chair. A stack of books stood beside the chair. Most of them appeared to be zoological works, although I noticed among them _The Collected Works of Robert Frost_ and Thoreau's _Walden._

On the wall were various pictures of animals, tacked up not altogether artistically. What caught and held my attention, however, was a poster taped on the wall over the desk. One corner was missing entirely and the edges were scarred with tiny rips. Without thinking--thinking was getting a little difficult at this point--I stood and walked over to see it more closely. The poster was an underwater picture of a school of fish in a sea-blue lake. My eyes were beginning to blur from lack of food and from the beer. I leaned over the desk and read the words printed across the bottom: _Who hears the fishes when they cry?_ Henry David Thoreau.

I tried to rub the fatigue out of my eyes, and then I read the statement again. The words puzzled me. I knew he was the best at what he did, but I also knew him to be a rational, pragmatic scientist. The poster had been folded a number of times and looked old. Some of the fold lines looked as if they would tear at the least touch. I was about to ask Colin about the poster when his voice intruded upon my thoughts.

"Come and eat your sandwich. I want to get to bed and I can't with you hanging around."

"I'll take it to my room," I replied. I believe that is what you might call a calm, dismissive voice. I was getting warm, so I took off my jacked and dropped it on his chair. I walked back to the coffee table, picked up my sandwich, and felt my head begin the doggy paddle. I set the sandwich down quickly, and plopped back on the couch. "I'm not really hungry."

"Eat it here, so I know you won't throw it out. If you're going to keep up with me, you have to eat." I took another sip of beer. "You won't make it back to your room if you..."

"Oh, I'll make it back to my room. And I'll keep up with you, too." How brave was that! I stood up and fell back onto the couch again. I wasn't drunk, but my doggy-paddle was insufficiently advanced to conquer the stormy sea that was my head.

Colin said quietly, "Eat." He handed me the sandwich and I took a tiny bite. And bite by tiny bite, I managed to get half of it down.

"Eat that other half. I'll make you another," Colin said.

"Oh no!" I jumped up quickly. Doggy paddle quit altogether, and, once again, I fell backwards. I reached my hand back to catch myself, and it fell--you guessed it--on Dr. Colin McCullough's lap where It was not asleep.

I pulled my hand away and decided, at that precise moment, to immediately quit the documentary project and fly back home. "I'm sorry." I could feel a flush move up my neck and flood my cheeks. I gave my head a little shake. "I guess the beer made me a little dizzy."

"I'm not surprised," Colin said. He put his arm over my shoulder and pulled me toward him. His hand cupped my chin and turned my face up to his. "And don't be sorry."

"I..." but that was it for words. He covered my mouth with his, and he had the softest lips and the most insistent tongue that had ever existed in the history of this planet or any other planet, for that matter. Exaggeration, but words don't do the job. Lava bubbled. My tongue responded to his tongue and--breadcrumbs eaten by fairy-tale critters--I lost my way home. Any semblance of control had left the stadium. I was under the influence of way too many things at the moment. I turned to him, lifted my leg over his legs, and he pulled me up on his lap, facing him.

I'd bet my lovely Ms. Thongy that he was as out of control as I was. He lowered his mouth to my neck. With both hands he slid the straps of my tank top down my shoulders. I reached my arms around his neck and wished I'd worn a bra under my top. No, I didn't. That was a lie. I didn't wish that at all. He hooked his fingers over the neckline of my tank top, pulled it down and nestled it beneath the ladies. There they were, proud of how quick all this was going. Colin cupped them with his hands, returned his lips to my mouth, began exploring with his tongue, and his hands, all warm and cuddly, got busy with my ladies. I couldn't help myself then and started moving my hips.

He moved his lips to my neck, kissed me there. "Cinn," he whispered against my skin. Then, he lowered his head to one of my dear and happy ladies. Oh, he was losing control, all right. Me, too, by the way. We were both in the zone. "Cinn,..are you sure?" he mumbled as his mouth closed over one of my breasts. He pulled my tank top over my head, tossed it on the couch beside him, and latched back on. I ran my fingers through his hair and pulled his head tight against my breast. Colin paused a moment and looked up into my eyes. "Cinn, I don't want to take..."

"It's OK," I was still middle of the zone. Granny would have used the word "shameless."

He latched on again. I grabbed hold of his shoulders and held tight. My hips got busy.

"It's OK," I whispered in his ear. "I'm on the spill."

He pulled his mouth away, leaned his head against my chest, wrapped his arms around me, and held me.

"It's OK," I repeated.

"No, it's not." His voice was husky. He leaned his head back, took my cheeks in his hands, looked me in the eyes, traced his finger softly over my lips. "You said _spill_.

"No, I didn't. I said _spill_ , I mean _pill_." I moved my lips close to his. I was beyond turned on.

"You said _spill_. I'm not going to take advantange of you."

I took his face between my hands. "You're not. You're really, really not."

"Yes, I am. That's not me," he said quietly. He picked up my tank top and slid it over my head. Darn. "Help me here," he added. I put my arms through the armholes and he adjusted the shirt down over my khakis. Double darn.

He moved me off of his lap. Double dog darn. Why did he have to be such a gentleman? And there's me, feeling like a hussy.

But, I said _spill_ instead of _pill_ and apparently he's a gentleman, so we sat all hot and huggy for what seemed like--oh, a decade. I could hear his breath. It was labored, but as it slowed--neither of us touching erogenous zones--so did mine. And then I knew it was time for me to be heading home.

I thought I'd try nonchalance. "OK, well..." I took the last sip of beer, stood up, steadied myself, and looked around for my jacket. He had already picked it up from the chair. Gentleman that he is, he held it so I could slip my arms in their armholes, then he pulled it around in front of me. He held it closed at the neck and kissed me on the cheek.

He handed me my messenger bag, stuck the other half of the sandwich in my other hand, and walked me to the door. On the veranda, at the top of the steps, he took my cheeks in his hands, and kissed my forehead. My lips were furious. They wanted him. "Thanks for the beer," I said. "Oh," I held up the half sandwich. "And for this..." I did not want to leave. And, further more, I was still on the spill, I mean the pill. My fiancé had passed away a long time ago, and I was still on the pill, never had the heart to go off of it. That meant finality, even though I knew in my head it was final. So, what's wrong with wanting to stay? Why not? Three years of grief-enveloped abstinence. Why the hell not?

I looked up the dark path. I looked back over my shoulder. Colin was standing on the veranda. The door to his cabin was open. The room had warmth to it, created by the flickering light of the lantern. I longed to stay in the coziness, protected from the life and death struggles that went on outside the door, protected from the memory of my fiancé as he had faded and faded from me over the past three years of his life.

I straightened up, took big girl, professional, not-a-hussy breath, and said, "Good night, Dr. Colin McCullough." My voice may have been a little sassy, but the state I was in I wasn't sure.

"You're welcome," he called from the porch. The sarcasm was back, probably in response to my sassiness. I hadn't thanked him, and he was saying "You're welcome? If I recalled I'd said _Good night._ And you have to know, even before he and I knew, that what followed was a momentous effort, on both our parts, to walk away from each other. He wanted to be a gentleman. I wanted to dig myself out of shameless hussyhood.

I don't have a clue what came over me, but I know that what followed was entirely my fault. I'd spent so much time being strong, beating down grief, working on my craft of writing, that this new, hussy-like me scared me to death. I walked to the foot of the porch stairs and looked up at him. "If you're hinting for me to thank you for the sandwich, forget it. You made me eat it."

"What would you have done if I hadn't? Stalked a zebra and gotten your face kicked in?" He was having a hard time being a gentleman because that was low of him. I was stunned. Tears welled in my eyes. I turned back to the path so that Colin wouldn't see them. He came down the porch steps, grabbed my arm and swung me around to face him. "You can't place what happened in its natural framework, can you?"

"Yes, I can."

"You cried out there. And the mere mention of the lioness makes you cry again." He paused. His voice got softer. "How are you going to film the whole of a lion's life when even you can't face how many of them die. Are you going to put the face of that lioness on a screen so that her injury is larger than life? It would be cruel."

"How can you speak of cruel?" I said. I jerked my arm out of his grasp. "You don't even care."

"I don't cry anymore, if that's what you mean."

"That's what I mean. That's exactly what I mean." I could feel my temper rising. Oh, yes, we were both trying hard to get away from each other, and sometimes a fight is the easiest way to do that. I hadn't gone all psychoanalyst, but I knew what was happening. That didn't mean I could control my anger.

Colin was angry, too. "You come to the Serengeti from your Hollywood studio and expect to film the life of the lion. Your ideas of the lion's life are right out of the research books. You have no idea what it is to know the life of the lion—the cubs that starve, the gazelle fawns that are flushed from the grass and killed, their screams that come in from the prairie at night." I was speechless. I could see the pulse in Colin's jaw throbbing just below his ears. His mouth was set. "You intend to go after the soul of the lion, you said. You will settle for nothing less, and yet you can't even face the soul of the lion yourself. How can you expect to give it to your audience?" He paused. I couldn't find the words to protest because what he said was true. Then he said, his voice almost a whisper, "I didn't think you could take it."

I looked up sharply at him, a surge of anger rushing through me. Not having to dog paddle anymore, by golly. Fully alert. "What do you mean you didn't think I could take it? Did you take me out this afternoon so I would have to see a kill, on my first night here, so you could see me like this?" Colin didn't answer but I could see in his eyes that I was right. "I'm not here to play games, Dr. McCullough. I'm here to work." My heart beat furiously in my ears.

"Then why did you cry? Why are you crying now?"

"I'm crying because I'm human. You may be a cold, scientific machine, but I'm not." I knew I'd gone too far. Of course, I couldn't get myself to shut up. "I know what I'm here for. I knew before I came. And if my knowledge seems textbook, it is. I've never been to the Serengeti." I could feel my voice break. "I've never seen an animal killed before, and I've never seen an animal injured like that mother lion, but that doesn't mean I can't do my job." Tears were streaming down my face, but I didn't care.

"Look at you," Colin gripped my shoulders. "Are you going to leave your audience like that."

"I don't know." I twisted out of his hold, and turned to go up the path. A night breeze brushed against me and cooled my cheeks. Impulsively, I turned back to him. "I may have tears, but at least that means I'll be able to feel for the audience. At least I'll be able to help interpret what goes on. But you, you act like it's ordinary."

Colin answered softly, almost kindly, "It is ordinary." His words caught me off guard.

I looked up at him, his hair ruffled slightly by the breeze. He stuck his hands in his pockets. He finally broke the silence. "Welcome to the Serengeti, C.S. Wyatt-Jones, as it really is."

Speechless, I turned and started down the porch steps. His voice followed me. "I'll watch as you walk up to the lodge."

I didn't turn back, but I said over my shoulder, with lots and lots of attitude, "I'm a big girl, Dr. McCullough. I can take care of myself."

"Don't take chances in the dark, Lionbait, inside or out."

I quickened my step. Then I heard a loud Clap Clap Clap. It was Colin, scaring off any wild animals that might be about. In my anger, I'd forgotten.

I hurried to my room. I opened the door quietly so I wouldn't wake up Randi. I slipped inside. I leaned against the closed door for a moment. "Will I always give him the impression that I have no common sense at all?" I said softly.

I slipped into a t-shirt and pair of undies, brushed my teeth, and crawled into bed. At least I'd get a few hours of sleep, if I could fall asleep, that is. I could feel Colin's mouth cover mine and his hands as they slid down the straps of my tank top, his hands as they covered my shoulders, and gently slid down over my breasts. Why did I have to say _spill_ instead of _pill_. Why did he have more self-control than I obviously--very obviously to him I'm sure--did.

I must have fallen asleep, because when the alarm went off, I had to pull myself a long way out of sleep.

"Morning," said Randi. I forced myself to sit up. She'd already had a shower and had a towel wrapped around her. "You got in late last night."

"In the field with Colin. Then he made me a sandwich because we hadn't had dinner. Peanut butter. And he gave me a beer."

Randi got dressed and was starting out the door. I was still sitting with my head in my hands. "Randi?"

She stopped and looked back at me. I looked up. "He's...He's..."

Randi came back and sat on the bed next to me. "Easy to work with?" I shook my head no. "Difficult to work with?" I shook my head yes. "Sexy?" I shook my head yes.

"I can't even talk around him. I sound like an idiot. And I haven't been here...what?...two days and we've..."

"Made love?" I shook my head no. "Made out?" I shook my head yes.

"And I don't know how it happened. I mean, I do, but..."

"Sexy." She said it without the question mark. I shook my head yes. "Enjoy it. You deserve it. It's been too long."

"I don't want to be a fling."

"You're not the flingy type."

"Anyway..."

"Have fun. That's my advice. And who knows?"

"But I don't want to fling him either."

"You won't. I know you."

I looked up at her. "Thanks, Randi. I'll be right over. I'll take a quick shower, wake up, see you at breakfast."

She gave me a pat on the back, went to the door, and opened it. She looked back at me. "I don't think he's the flingy type either. Just sayin'. See you in a bit.
Chapter 6

Howard's voice called to me the minute I walked into the dining room. "Cinn, over here." I was tired. I wanted coffee. I poured myself a cup and wandered over to Howard's table. "What about the NASA films? What did you decide?" he asked.

Not even a kindly good morning. My heart sank. I'd forgotten. "I need another day to think, Howard. I didn't have a second to write yesterday."

Howard set down his cup of coffee. "Come on, Cinn. They're expecting my email this morning."

"What time?"

"After breakfast. Around 9:00. Why?"

"I'll tell you at 9:00."

"You're stalling."

I tried to grin at him over my coffee cup. No luck. I'd been on the Serengeti less than forty-eight hours, was almost eaten by a lion, spent a difficult afternoon and evening out in the field with Dr. Colin McCullough, gotten into a number of sarcasm matches with the same difficult scientist, lost every single sarcasm match, and had an unexpected volcanic incidence on a kopje, compliments of the same scientist, and if Dr. McCullough knew how easily he got me going...

Howard interrupted my thoughts, "Cinn?"

"I know I'm stalling. I'll let you know. I promise."

"Good morning," said Perry. He sat down at our table. His plate of bacon, eggs, and buttered toast looked good. With only a peanut butter sandwich for supper, I was hungry.

"Don't go away, Perry. I have an idea to tell you about." I went to the serving table to get my food, returned, took a bite of bacon, and said, "Listen to this." I told them about my idea of filming the lions at rest from overhead. "If we could get that on film, with the right music, it would be humorous and, at the same time, give an important contrast to the rest of the documentary." I could tell Perry and Howard were interested. "Tchaikovsky, _1812 Overture_. Each cannon boom is timed with an ear or tail flip or with each lazy step as they move to the shade."

"With careful editing it could be dynamite," said Perry

I smiled. "I think they should be filmed from overhead, so that the audience is looking right into the middle of the pride. We'd have to build a small platform in the tree for the remote camera. Dr. McCullough could probably show us a tree that the lions seem to favor."

Howard said, "You're taking a chance that one of our cameras could be essentially useless the whole two months if the pride doesn't return to that tree."

I smiled, "I'm willing to chance it."

"It's not your money," Howard said. Of course, he would say that.

"I agree with Cinn. The idea is too good not to try."

Howard pulled off his glasses and massaged the bridge of his nose. He looked at Perry and then at me. "I agree."

"I'd like to get the crew going on that platform today," Perry said.

"The sooner the better as far as I'm concerned," said Howard. "Let's get it done this morning."

"Dr. McCullough is probably in the field already."

"Well, hurry down there and find out," said Howard. "He needs to guide us to a good tree." I took a bite of toast. "Go on. I'll guard your breakfast."

"Then get me some fresh coffee." I hurried out the door. I glanced down at Colin's cabin. The Land Rover was still there. I started down the path, reached the porch, and went up the steps. It was pit in the stomach time: tank top off, tongues in mouths, hands on breasts, tough scientist and his truths about the Serengeti, my tears, a can of beer making me dog paddle through a swimmy brain, and then the big, sarcasm fight. Those are the thoughts that accompanied me to his door. Nothing to do but knock. I did. I heard footsteps. The door opened, and there he was, no shirt, those faded blue jeans, top button not buttoned, hanging low around his hips, one hand drying his wet hair, and all of him smelling clean, like rinsed-off soap. I had a flash of licking his chest, and that is not a thought I had ever had in my life. Ever! I fought the thought back and spoke," Sorry to bother you, but we need you."

"Hang on a minute. Let me get a shirt." He left the door open and walked into his bedroom. I turned to look out upon the beauty of Nyaraswiga Hill, so I could steer my thoughts into proper channels. "Come on in," he called. I turned, stepped inside, and he was coming out of his bedroom, buttoning up a khaki shirt. My inner, secret self whined, _Oh don't button it._

I waited for him to say something. Yes, I know, it was my place to say something to him because that was why I'd come to his cabin, but I'd lost my ability to talk, so cut me some slack. Colin stuck his hands in the pockets of his jeans and looked down at me, his eyes doing their unconscious thing, roaming here and there over my body. I don't think he was aware that his eyes were such blatant rascals. I was. I did a mental fruit-of-the-loom check. Zipper of khaki shorts up. Tank top not see through. Bra uplifting. No nipples making visible little hills. I glanced down, quickly, and yes, they were making little hills even with a bra on, but at least not big mountain hills. I still hadn't opened my mouth.

"Good morning, Lionbait." He stepped behind me to close the door. "What is it you need?"

I gave myself a mental shake. "Good morning."

"What can I do for you?" He unzipped his jeans to tuck his shirt in, and I swear on a stack of pancakes, his eyes never left mine. I mean, jeez, can I get a break with this man? Professional writer. Professional writer. Professional writer.

I forced myself to look straight into his eyes. "I wanted to ask you about trees." Ugh.

"Ask." He turned from me and walked into the bedroom.

"Which one do lions like?" I called after him. Double Ugh. Try again. "Which tree would you suggest we build a platform on for our camera, like I told you yesterday, to catch the lions, you know, sleeping and resting and flicking their ears and tails." I clamped my mouth shut. My secret inner self thought the following: _This is ridiculous. I'm Cinnamon Sugar Wyatt hyphen Jones._ It's a silly name, I know, but that was my Mom's fault, bless her heart. She met my dad over cinnamon sugar toast, loved him to pieces, and never forgot their first meeting. I honestly believe she scripted the speaking of my name to the Ob/Gyn nurse as one of her performance art pieces. I'm sure the nurse displayed some degree of surprise, thus playing an important, improvisational part in the performance, but I was brand new at the time and don't remember a thing about it. Anyway, Wyatt-Jones did add a bit of class, especially if the hyphen is said as a word. You end up with something like the first line of a poem. Consider the rhythm when said out loud. I hate to admit this, but my name also sounds like a football cheer _. Cinnamon Sugar Wyatt hyphen Jones. Go for a touchdown. Go Go Go_. If you get the stresses right, it's unnerving. And now you can understand why I didn't want to tell Dr. Colin McCullough what C.S. stood for.

I gathered together the moronic puddle that was me, stood up straight, and took one step toward the bedroom. "Dr. McCullough, I'd like to know which tree we are most likely to catch the Leo pride under during the next two months." Bingo!

"Third tree from the right," he said. Now, that was sarcasm. He emerged from his room pulling a belt through the loops on his jeans.

My cheeks got hot. "What I mean is..." Colin filled my vision as he towered in front of me, buckling his belt. I breathed deeply and caught a scent of his shaving cream.

_Cinnamon Sugar Wyatt hyphen Jones, Talk Team! Talk Team! Go Go Go!_ "I want to film the lions at rest under an acacia tree, with a remote camera above them." I paused. "I thought you'd already be in the field."

"Late night last night," he said. Yep, he grinned.

"Yes, well..." My mind wanted to shape-shift into a puddle again, but I gained the upper hand. "When I saw your Land Rover, I thought I'd come down and ask if you'd be willing to take the crew to a good tree...this morning, I mean."

"I would," Colin said as he walked in the kitchen. He called over his shoulder, "There's no way of knowing whether..."

"I know. I know." I followed him into the kitchen. "The camera could sit there for two months and never even see a mosquito."

Colin turned on the fire under the coffee. "But you'll take your chances, right, Lionbait?" I nodded. _Lionbait_ was actually starting to grow on me. "Tell your crew to be down here in an hour." He reached into his icebox for a package of bacon and a box of eggs.

"They'll be here," I replied. Colin put the bacon in the frying pan and it began to sizzle. I found myself staring at it.

Colin looked at me. "Hungry?"

I shook my head. "I've got breakfast up there. Howard's guarding it for me." Triple Ugh. "Well..." I stammered, "...see you in an hour."

"On time," he said, turning back to the bacon. "Or I'll leave without you."

"I know you will." I didn't sound sarcastic. That's a big step up for sassy ole me.

I turned and walked into the living room toward the front door. I heard Colin crack two eggs into a bowl and begin to beat them. I opened the door, stepped on the porch, and maintained enough control to close the door slowly behind me until I heard it latch with a deliberate click.
Chapter 7

I took a moment to gather my emotions. I breathed in a big batch of Serengeti air. Then I picked up my step as I headed back to the dining room. I knew the tech crew would have to hurry to be ready in an hour.

I eluded Howard until I was climbing into one of the two company Land Rovers that were going out with Colin. Perry and two other members of the crew had already loaded their Rover with the necessary lumber and tools. I was going to drive the other Land Rover. I turned the key in the ignition.

"Cinn, it's nine o'clock."

Howard. Decision time. Stall. "I have to go. Dr. McCullough said he would leave without us if we weren't ready on time." I threw the Land Rover in gear, but Howard reached his hand in the window and placed it on the steering wheel. "Cinn..."

"I don't know yet!"

He reached through the window to the ignition, turned off the key, and dangled it in front of me. He didn't say anything. He didn't have to. My time was up. "OK," I said. "Tell them yes."

"For the opening?"

"No."

"For what?"

'I don't know, yet."

"Cinn..."

"You told me I had to decide whether or not to get the film, not how I was going to use it." I grabbed the keys from his hand and quickly turned on the ignition.

"Cinn..."

"Just tell them yes for me. Now step back or I'll run over your toes."

Howard backed up. I followed the other Land Rover to Colin's cabin. He was just backing up, and our small convoy headed into the field.

About five miles from Seronera, Colin stopped. As the tech crew unloaded the lumber and tools, he pointed out a tree to Perry. It stood about fifty feet from the road. I turned off the ignition, got out, and hurried over to them, but Colin had already returned to his Land Rover and started the motor. Perry and the crew began walking toward the tree.

Colin swung his Land Rover around and stopped beside me. He leaned out the window. "I'm going out to spot the Leo pride, if I can. Tell your boss I've decided to radio-collar one of the females so I can find the pride easier for you. I'll be leaving at 8:00 tonight if he wants to film it."

"I can decide that myself," I replied. "We'll be there." He drove off. I walked over to Perry. "I'm heading back to do some writing. Radio Randi if you need anything and I'll make it happen."

I drove back to the lodge, went to my room, sat at a small desk, and worked on the script until lunchtime. In the afternoon the crew and I traveled through the Serengeti, filming the landscape and its many other animals. Randi sat in the front with me. She hadn't been in the field, yet, and she deserved the time away from ledger books.

That night, the moon bathed the Serengeti in silver-white light. Dim shadows stretched from the acacia trees. As I walked down the path to Colin's cabin, I noticed that even my own shadow stretched behind, as if it belonged to the land. I looked up to the brilliant white light of the moon. I couldn't ever remember having seen it so bright.

I zipped up my jacket against the coolness of the night air. I carried my messenger bag in one hand and a thermos of coffee in the other. It would be a night full of business and hard work, and I was anxious to get going.

Perry and Patch, with two other members of the tech crew, had already driven to Colin's house. They were talking with him on the porch when I arrived.

When they spotted me they headed down the steps. I hurried after Colin. He had already turned the key in the ignition when I reached his Rover. I went up to his window. "I'm going with you...to ask you questions."

"Get in." He reached across the seat to open the door.

I hurried to the passenger side and we drove off into the night. I glanced at Colin. He wore the same, pair of sung, faded jeans (maybe he had a drawer full of them) and a khaki shirt with the sleeves rolled up. I felt a flush of warmth move through my body. I unzipped my jacked and glanced at him again. His hair curled slightly on his neck and, for some strange reason, it made him seem vulnerable. Before I could stop myself, I asked, "Do you ever get lonely in your work?"

Colin turned briefly to me, and then looked back at the road. He remained silent. I wondered if he'd heard me.

"Do you ever get lonely out here?" I repeated.

"I heard you the first time." His voice sounded sharp. Where was this coming from? "There's no funding agency that says you can force yourself into my private life as you've forced your way into my research."

I was flat-out stunned. He'd had his tongue in my mouth for crying out loud, and he'd stripped my shirt off, and it was only twenty-four hours ago. Force my way into his private bleeping life!?! "I didn't force..."

"Yes, you did, and you know it." His jaw was set. "I not only have a Land Rover, a crew, cameras, sound equipment, and you following me into the field on what should have been a relatively quiet night, I have you asking me things that are none of your damn business."

"Back up, Buster." _Back up Buster???_ Where did that come from? A 1940's B movie? "You told us you were going out tonight to radio-collar a female lion. For Us! You invited us along."

He didn't say a word. I wondered what was wrong. We drove for at least a light-year in silence as tangible as the Land Rover we were sitting in, and a whole lot less comfortable. I knew I should ask him some questions. It was my job. I even knew the questions I wanted to ask. Why, in the name of that Buster guy, did I start out with a personal one? He had looked vulnerable tonight. I'd been vulnerable the night before. Shirt off, breasts getting a lot of attention. I had work to do, questions planned out carefully and written down. But I couldn't get myself to say another word.

Finally, the Land Rover slowed and stopped. Under an acacia tree, where Colin had spotted them that morning. I saw the Leo pride. They lifted their heads indolently, their eyes glinting red in the glare of the headlights. One of the lionesses sat up, and I saw it was the one with the broken jaw. I was riveted by the sight of her, her tawny head and chest a ghostly shadow in the moonlight. The lion's healthy, muscular body belied the days and weeks that were ahead. I knew she would starve. There was a whole story to be read in the face of the lioness and I knew, in an instant, what I had to do.

Colin had already gotten out of the Land Rover and was at the back of the vehicle getting his Cap-chur gun. He didn't see me slip out and walk back toward the other vehicle. Perry was standing up through the sunroof readying the camera. I whispered up to him, "I want you to get film on that lion over there, the one that's sitting up. Her jaw was kicked in by a zebra last night. See her?" Perry nodded. I continued, "Her jaw was broken and..." I paused for a moment. "I just think we should have some film on her." Perry gave me a thumb's up. Patch and his assistant were readying the sound equipment.

I was heading back to Colin's Rover when I felt a hand grab my arm and pull me brusquely the last few steps. Colin, of course. He backed me against the Land Rover and towered over me.

"What's wrong?"

"Out for a walk, Lionbait?" His voice was sarcastic, but I could tell by the hard line of his jaw that he wasn't teasing.

"I was just asking Perry to film that lioness. Why?"

He let go of my arm and placed his hands against the Land Rover on either side of my shoulders. Jeez, he could be overpowering. I opened my mouth to ask him what I'd done wrong, but he spoke first. "You got out of the Land Rover and walked away from it. In all the research you say you've done, didn't you learn that lions are afraid of humans on foot?"

"Well, I..." Actually, I had read that, was truly and absolutely aware of that fact. But my excitement to talk to Perry had trumped my common sense and my _months and months_ of research (italics used to signal sarcasm directed at me by me). I guess it was simply another example of forgetting my fruit-of-the-looms in the heat of the moment. (In first grade, it was about Tommy, who wore denim overalls and a yellow sweatshirt, and my six-year old self was in love with his six-year old self although he didn't have a clue. He and I were supposed to recite a little poem we'd memorized, a kind of first grade, spoken duet. That's the reason I'd forgotten my Tuesday panties that morning. I was in little-league love and not taking the time for practical thought). Back to the big leagues. As you recall, I was on defense, up against the Land Rover, his arms blocking me in. I went for the tackle (I know, wrong sport for the current metaphor). "You got out." Petulant tone. Bad tackle.

"I know what I'm doing. You don't." He pointed toward the pride where all the adults were now sitting or standing, glancing warily toward me. "I stayed close to the Land Rover so they couldn't distinguish it from me. You might as well have stood in a spotlight."

"But..."

"Get back in the Land Rover." Oh my, oh my, he was really, very, very disgusted with me.

"But..."

"Don't argue with me. Do it." And that _Do it_ was loud enough to be heard in the Perry/Patch Land Rover. Embarrassing. Colin led me to the passenger door and I quickly got in. He picked up his Cap-chur gun and went around to his side of the Land Rover. He stood quietly, watching the lions. I looked out my window. As the minutes passed, and not quickly I might add, the lions settled down. I did, too. I know Colin thought I was an absolute idiot, but moping was a bore. I had a job to do. I pulled my notebook out of my bag, opened it, and grabbed a pencil from one of the pockets.

"Why do you do this at night?" I asked in my quiet, inside voice.

To my surprise he responded calmly, as if I hadn't, like totally, pissed him off a moment ago. "The tranquilizer works better if a lion has been resting. I like to do it in the evening because within an hour or two after being tranquilized, the lion will be up and moving as the pride begins to hunt. That way I can be sure the drug has worn off completely."

He filled a metal cylinder with tranquilizer and slipped it into the barrel of the rifle. I could hear the hum of the camera, and I knew Perry was already filming the lioness with the broken jaw. Perry trained it on Colin when he stood, the rifle tucked to his shoulder.

I jumped at the sudden, loud, explosive charge when he fired the gun, sending the metal syringe expertly into the back leg of the lion where a small charge behind the plunger detonated, forcing the plunger down and pushing the liquid drug into the lion.

To my surprise, the lions didn't run away. The lioness that had been shot with the dart simply grunted, took a swat at the male lying next to her, as if he'd been the one to cause the disturbance (I understood the feeling), and settled down on the ground again. The lion with the broken jaw stood, ambled to the backside of the tree, and sat, cocking her head quizzically. Her two cubs scampered under her. I hoped Perry had filmed them.

Within a minute, I noticed that the drugged lion was licking her lips.

"Good," Colin said. He whispered in my direction. "That's a sign the drug is working. Sometimes the charge doesn't detonate and I end up with a syringe in the hip of a fully conscious lion."

After nearly five minutes, Colin climbed back in the Land Rover and drove closer, positioning the vehicle next to the drugged lion. As he approached, the other lions stirred from their places and walked away. About thirty feet from the tree, they stopped, turned, and eyed Colin, cocking their heads with an almost puzzled look on their faces. I could see their eyes blaze in the light from the Land Rover. I felt my skin prickle when Colin pulled on the brake and opened his door.

I reached out and touched his arm. "What if they charge you?"

"I'll dive in your lap," he replied, matter-of-factly. He started to get out and briefly turned back to me. "I have been charged before, so leave the door open."

His apparent calmness all my senses go on alert. All I could hear in the stillness of the night was my heart. Colin looked around at the lions that encircled him, gauging their response to him, and knelt down beside the drugged female.

"She's out," he said softly in my direction. He stood and reached through the window into the back for the radio collar. "While I'm putting this on, keep an eye on the others for me."

"OK." I tried to keep my voice calm like his, but he was asking me to keep an eye on a pride of lions so that they wouldn't--what?--eat him?

"And don't say anything," he said. Serious voice. Attaching the collar took only a couple of minutes, but to me it seemed like a mega-hour. I wanted to watch Colin, but didn't dare take my eyes off the circle of lions around him. When a male took a step toward him, I had to force myself to remain quiet. Screaming was preeminent on my mind, but the lion had stopped and wasn't going to charge, and I couldn't let my nerves kill my scientist.

Colin stood, hands on hips, looking down for a long time at the drugged lion. The moon was still low enough in the sky that Colin's shadow stretched out, reaching out to the circle of lions in a way that seemed to embrace them. Then he brushed his hair back off his forehead and slipped quietly into the seat beside me. He didn't close his door, but remained, intently watching the lioness.

Within ten minutes, she began lifting her head. Soon, she was standing, still wobbly from the drugs. I could see that the effects from the drug were wearing off. I looked at my watch by the small, dash light, and made note of the time in my notebook.

By eleven o'clock, the lioness was up and moving with the rest of the pride. Colin adjusted the receiver on the Land Rover until it picked up the steady beep-beep-beep of the transmitter around the her neck. Wherever the lioness went that night, we would follow. Colin told me that the radio could transmit up to two months. It meant he could find the pride while the production company was there. And, by carefully charting the movements of the pride, he could learn more about their territorial needs, their eating and mating habits, and their scuffles with nomadic lions that had wandered through their territory.

"Won't the collar bother her?"

"She may scratch at it for a while, but soon she'll forget it's there. It won't even rub away her hair."

When the lions ambled away from the tree, our Land Rovers followed. That night we saw and filmed two lion kills. At one of them, I saw the female with the broken jaw standing to one side, eyeing the carcass of the prey animal, but not making a move toward it, as if she knew, somehow, that she couldn't eat. Instinctively, I was certain that Perry had seen the same look in the lion's eyes and had turned his camera her way.

I looked for the cubs, but couldn't find them. "She's left her cubs in hiding, probably back by that tree," Colin said. It was like he'd read my thoughts. "Usually the mother lion goes back for them after a kill so they can eat." But for as long as we watched her, she didn't return for her cubs.

The sky was beginning to lighten when the pride finally settled under an acacia tree for the day. I leaned back in my seat. I was exhausted. Colin snapped off the radio receiver, and then stretched his arms over his head. A couple of lions had eaten so much they seemed uncomfortable on the ground. They stood up, paced, then sat, tried to lie down again, only to rise again, and pace some more.

Perry, Patch and the crew started back toward Seronera, but Colin still sat quietly, watching the lions. Morning dew freshened the air, and a gentle silence seemed to spread over the land with the growing light.

I felt myself growing drowsy. I was startled when Colin spoke. "I do get lonely sometimes," he said, as if a stretch of ten hours hadn't separated my question from his answer. I straightened up, and looked at him. "But I have experiences out here I'd have nowhere else in the world." He glanced at me. "What I do is demanding. I couldn't ask a woman to understand my hours. And I couldn't ask a woman to give up her work in order to follow me into one wilderness after another." His look grew intense. "Because that is what I'm going to be doing the rest of my life." He was trying to tell me something. He was trying to tell me that shirts off, tongues in mouth, hands on breasts was a temporary, shall we say, loss of hormonal control, that it didn't mean commitment and it didn't mean love.

He turned the key in the ignition and said quietly, "It's easier to be married to my work than to face falling in love with a woman who couldn't or wouldn't follow where my work leads me." He slammed the Land Rover into gear, and he added, his voice husky with flat-out male emotion. "And I'll be damned if the woman I marry is going to sleep in any other bed than mine, even if mine is a sleeping bag under the stars."

"Some women would be happy to sleep in your sleeping bag," I said innocently. Well, not too innocently. "What I mean is, there are some women who would understand your work. I would. I mean...I don't mean to say..." I clamped my mouth out. And of course, I flushed all the way to my hair follicles. "I just mean to say that you don't have to be married to your work, if you don't want to be, that is."

Colin looked at me and actually laughed. "You need a good night's sleep, Lionbait. It sounds like you just proposed to me."

"No, I didn't. I said 'some women' not me...I...myself. You know what I mean. It was a generalization."

"Don't generalize, sweetheart. It doesn't suit you."

Sweetheart! And after the no-commitment, no-love comment he'd just made. I didn't want commitment either. I wanted to write. And I didn't want love, because it hurts forever to lose some you love, but mostly I didn't want to be patronized. "Don't worry, darling (strong, sarcastic emphasis on the _darling_ ) I'm not proposing. And don't patronize me with the sweetheart thing."

He grinned, hooked his finger in the neckline of my shirt, pulled me toward him, and kissed me on the forehead. Jeez, his lips were soft.

He let go of my shirt and put the Rover in gear. Time for me to speak up again. Sometimes I just can't help myself. "And don't patronize me with the little kisses. I don't need a father to peck me on the cheek and forehead."

He turned off the Land Rover, pulled me to him, and did the deep explore and conquer kiss. I'm assuming he wanted to make a point that he wasn't in the least playing the father game. One hand was behind my head. The other was slipping inside my shirt.

I pulled away from his kiss. "Listen..."

What the hell had happened? No commitment, no love. And what was this? I mean, I knew we were attracted to one another, but I sure didn't want to be a two-month fling. I'd never done that before. I'd always loved the man I gave myself to. Well, the one man.

I pushed away from him, firmly took his hand away from my breast, and backed against the door.

"I don't want to do this," I said. Had to clear my throat a couple of time. "I mean I do, but I can't." I paused. "I don't do the no-commitment thing."

"I wasn't asking for that," he said simply. He looked deep into my eyes. "My feelings have nothing fatherly about them. You don't need to lecture me about what kind of kiss I can give you, and whether or not I can call you sweetheart, (pause and a definite emphasis coming up) Sweetheart."

He started the Land Rover. I leaned back in my seat. Why couldn't I keep my mouth shut and just enjoy him for two months? I closed my eyes and was sound asleep within minutes.
Chapter 8

Someone was shaking my shoulder. I opened my eyes, and there was Colin standing beside the passenger door. The Land Rover was parked at the cabin.

"I must have fallen asleep," I said, straightening up, straightening my clothes.

"You did." He took me by the elbow and helped me out of the car. He reached into the back, retrieved my bag, and handed it to me.

"Thank you," I said. It was still dark. "I'll see you later today."

"You're welcome," he said. He hooked his finger into the neckline of my shirt and pulled me toward him. He gave me a kiss on the forehead. "It was a pleasure. You want to come in?"

Oh, that would be a yes, but was that something I wanted to do? How much of myself would I lose when I had to leave the Serengeti? I couldn't stand any more losses in my life. No commitment, no love. So that makes it a no.

"You think way too much," he said. "Come in for coffee, or a chat, or we can read poetry to each other, or we can go to bed and make love. I know you're on the _spill_ because you told me so. Or we can fight. Whatever you want."

"Look..."

"I won't attack you..."

"You did in the car..."

"I didn't hear you say no, and that wasn't an attack. That was a demonstration."

"Look..."

"I'm tired. Come in or not."

What the hell! I followed him inside. He heated up some coffee, poured us each a cup, and we sat on the couch, not saying a word, sipping coffee. Finally, he put down his empty cup, and I put down my empty cup. He pulled a pillow onto his lap and patted it. I lay down and curled up with my back to him and my head on the pillow. He brushed my hair off my face, and whispered, "Go to sleep." He put both feet on the coffee table, leaned his head back, and we fell asleep.

At some point, I opened my eyes. It was still dark. I felt his hand around me cupping my left breast. He wasn't moving a muscle, and I knew he was asleep. I would bet money that he was a security-blanket toddler. I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep again.

I woke up again just as it was beginning to get light. I could tell by Colin's breathing that he was still sound asleep, his hand still resting gently over my breast. I could have stayed there forever. But I had to shower, get dressed, and have breakfast before we went into the field again. And Howard would want to see me, I was sure of that. As gently as possible, I took hold of his hand and pulled it away from me. I heard him breathe a bit more quickly. I kissed the palm of his hand and rolled out from under his arm. His breathing slowed again, and I knew I could tiptoe out without waking him.

I hurried up the path and quietly opened the door to my room. Randi was still asleep, so I tiptoed in, and went into the bathroom. I turned on the water in the bathtub. Steam filled the air, and when I sprinkled a few drops of fresh-smelling lavender oil into the water, the aroma made me feel supremely feminine. I slipped out of my clothes, stepped into the tub, and lay back as the water rose around me, warming my muscles and relaxing me. As it inched up past my breasts, its warmth made me think of Colin's hands. I couldn't help myself. I smiled.

I reached to turn off the faucet. I picked up the bar of soap and began the serious part of a bath. I forced myself to focus on the work I had to do. I had a lot of writing ahead of me.

I got out of the tub and wrapped my towel around me. When I went back in the bedroom, the alarm was buzzing. Randi turned it off, and sat up, rubbing her eyes. "Good morning. Where were you last night?"

"In the field with Colin. And we went back to his cabin, and he sat on the couch, and I fell asleep on his lap."

Randi shook her head. "Is that all?"

I nodded. "It was kind of sweet."

"Sweet's good sometimes. Are you done in the bathroom?" I shook my head yes.

I slipped into a pair of khaki shorts and a black tank top. I pulled my hair into a braid. Then I lay down on my bed to wait for Randi, and I fell quickly to sleep. When she woke me up, she was already dressed, so we headed over to the dining room for breakfast. Patch was already there. He waved us over. I poured myself some coffee just as Howard walked up to the table.

"Randi," he said. "First thing today, confirm the studio reservations we have for two weeks from now in Nairobi. And the hotel reservations, for Perry, Patch, Cinn, and me."

"Will do," she replied. "The crew back here will be ready for a let-up in the schedule. And you four get to work."

"I don't mind," I said. "I'm anxious to see the film we've shot so far."

"Excuse me, folks," said Perry as he walked up to the table. "Cinn, we're building the blind on the kopje today. I want you to go there with us tomorrow morning before the sun rises, so we can get your reaction to the different light and shadow effects as the sun rises in the sky. I want to get as close as possible to your feelings for the opening scene. Light and shadow will have a lot to do with that."

The next two weeks seemed to fly by. Every morning one of the cameramen waited in the blind on the kopje, hoping the old male would return. To my relief, on the eighth day the lion returned to the same acacia tree where I'd seen him on my first morning on the Serengeti. Perry was happy with the film they'd shot. They'd already shot film of a _Gloriosa_ lily and an _Agama_ lizard. Later they would edit them in with the film of the lion. I couldn't wait to get to Nairobe to see what we had so far.

We went into the field with Colin every day. Twice we came upon the lioness with the broken jaw. Once she was sitting alone by the river. The second time she was with the pride under a tree. I could see the outline of her ribs along her once muscular side. The cubs were with her under the tree, but they didn't seem to want to play. They looked scrawny, almost starved. I knew Perry had a lot of film on the lioness and her cubs. It was film I dreaded seeing. I knew it would haunt me, but I had to make some sense of it so I could interpret it for the audience.

Before I knew it, it was the night before the four of us were to head to Nairobi. I climbed into Colin's Land Rover for another night of filming. As we drove into the plains, I looked over my shoulder to see Perry and Patch following in two other Land Rovers.

I glanced at Colin as he drove. He wore a denim shirt and a pair of khaki pants. It had been two weeks since he had done the no commitment, no love talk. I'd tried to be professional and had succeeded. No more kissing, no more hands under tank tops. He seemed to have understood that I was pulling back.

The headlights of the Land Rover tunneled ahead of us. Colin turned on his radio receiver to pick up the signal from the radio-collared lioness. When we drove up to the pride and parked, I looked for the lioness with the broken jaw. I couldn't find her among the lions resting under the acacia tree. I swallowed hard. She and her cubs had crept into my heart. I knew they would die, but knowing didn't make it any easier.

Within an hour, the pride began to stir. Soon they ambled away from the tree for a night of hunting. I thought I spotted something in a clump of grass to the right of the tree.

"Wait," I shouted, as Colin turned the key in the ignition to follow the pride. He turned to me, and I quietly repeated, "Wait."

I stared at the clump, but nothing moved. Maybe a breeze had stirred the grass. I turned to Colin. "I'm sorry. I thought I saw something."

He turned on the ignition again. When I looked back over my shoulder, I knew. I saw one, and then two little heads above the clump of grass, looking in the direction the pride had moved.

I threw open the door, just as Colin began to drive off. He slammed on the brakes, and I jumped out of the Land Rover. I had taken only a few steps when I felt his hands grab me. "What the hell are you doing?"

"The cubs," I said. "I saw the cubs over there." I pointed, but when Colin looked, there was no movement. "I saw them."

"You have to let them be," he said quietly, but firmly.

"They're dying," I said, pulling against his hold. My objectivity had left me as soon as I'd seen the cubs.

"There is nothing you can do," he said evenly, his voice betraying no emotion.

"I can give them food."

Colin put both hands on my shoulders. "Use what little common sense you have."

"Don't talk to me about common sense," I shot back, my voice tight from the effort of holding back tears. "They're starving."

"We're only here to observe."

I felt a great anguish swell within me. "Observe? Maybe you can do it, but I can't."

"You have to."

"No. You're the scientist. Not me."

He took a deep breath. He looked into my eyes. His voice was calm, almost kind. "They will be babies only a short time. They grow rapidly. You can't take care of two grown lions. They are not on earth to be pets. They are wild and they should live wild."

"I can give them to a zoo when they're healthy again."

"Zoos are already overburdened with lions."

"I'll retrain them to go back in the wild."

"Even if you knew how to do that, and you don't, they would have no pride to live in. Nomadic lions live a hard life."

I looked up into Colin's eyes, pleading with him silently.

"Do you understand what I'm saying?" he asked.

I didn't respond. Colin's grip softened and he moved to gather me into his arms to comfort me. I pulled away from him and ran toward where the cubs were huddled. He caught up to me just as I reached for them. He threw his arms around me and held me tightly from behind. I sobbed as I looked down at the two emaciated cubs. They looked up at me with fear in their eyes, and I could see them lean away from me. Colin held me tightly as I fought. Finally, I gave up and slumped against him.

"Please," I whispered. "Let me take care of them."

"No," he said softly. He turned me around to face him.

"I can't leave them." I tried to turn back to the cubs, but he held me firmly to his chest. "Please, I can't leave them."

"Then I'll make you," he said. I knew I wasn't going to win the battle. He walked me toward the Land Rover, one arm around my waist, the other firmly holding my arm. The door was already open. Colin half-lifted me into my seat. I tried to get out again, but he held me back. I leaned against him, and he held me while I sobbed. When my tears finally stopped, he closed the door, went around to the driver's side, climbed in, and drove away from the cubs.

I didn't talk the whole way back to Seronera. When Colin pulled up to his cabin, I reached into the back, grabbed my bag, climbed out of the Rover, and took off up the path. Colin followed and grabbed me and turned me toward him. "I'm not being very professional tonight, and I'm sorry," I said in a very cold, very formal voice. "Tomorrow, I'll pull myself together, but tonight..." I looked down at the ground, and then up into his eyes, "...tonight, I hate you."

He brushed his hand against my cheek, and when I flinched, he dropped his hand. "It's not me you hate," he said calmly. Perry and Patch pulled up in their Rovers. Colin stepped away from me. I turned around, walked up to the lodge, went to my room, and fell on the bed. I couldn't wait to get away from Seronera and from Colin.
Chapter 9

I had trouble sleeping that night. When I did drift off, the faces of the two cubs haunted my dreams. I kept trying to reach for them, but nightmare hands kept pulling me away. When the alarm finally rang before sunup, I'd never been so happy to have to get up. It would be good to get away from Dr. Colin McCullough and the harsh struggle for life on the Serengeti.

After an early breakfast, Howard, Perry, Patch, and I climbed aboard the bus to Nairobi. Exhausted from my lack of sleep, I soon found myself asleep on Howard's shoulder. When I woke up a few hours later, I tucked my knees to my chin, wrapped my arms around my legs, and stared out at the passing African landscape.

I was all mixed up. Never had I lost my objectivity so completely as I had the night before. I knew Perry had filmed me as I ran to help the cubs. Boy, that was putting myself in the middle of a story that I wasn't supposed to be in the middle of. I cringed at the thought of seeing myself on the screen.

I took a deep breath. I had a documentary to write, and it was time I pulled myself together. "Anybody bring cards," I asked. I looked toward Perry and Patch.

"No cards, but how about a joke or two?" Perry grinned at me.

I forced a small laugh. "All right. Come, on Howard. Change places with me." Howard climbed over me, sat down by the window, and buried himself in a book. I sat on the aisle, turned toward Perry and said, "OK. Entertain me."

By the time the bus arrived in Nairobi, I felt better. I leaned over Howard to look out at the bustling city. How noisy and how busy it seemed compared to the Serengeti!

All four of us managed to squeeze into the back of the taxi that took us to our hotel. After a warm meal in the dining room, I fell into a deep, relaxing sleep. Thank you, Mr. Sandman. I awoke the next morning, ready and eager for work.

When I looked at the film in the darkened studio, I had to smile. Before my eyes, once again, stretched the endless, beautiful land of the Serengeti.

First we watch the sequences shot of the _Gloriosa_ lily, the _Agama_ lizard, and the old male under the tree on the kopje. "Good," I said out loud. I knew the scene would work for the beginning. It was far less pretentious than the original Universe-Africa-Serengeti-lion sequence I had envisioned, using the NASA films of the earth. I knew that the simplicity of the film shot on the kopje was good. At least something had worked out well.

I admit that I sat up straight the first time Colin came on the screen, larger than life. He was tucking the Cap-chur gun to his shoulder to tranquilize the lioness to be radio-collared. He looked rugged and masculine. His soft lips and his insistent tongue and his hands, his exploring hands, flashed through my mind. I felt tingly, and I had to tell myself to "Work, dammit, work. Pay attention." I did. And I have to say I was proud of myself.

When I saw the film of the lioness with the broken jaw, I felt my heart catch in my throat. How could I make sense of what I was seeing so that the audience could make sense of it? It troubled me deeply. I knew it was the biggest block to my knowing what to do with the narrative for the film.

After dinner that night, Perry and Patch invited me to explore the city with them. Howard had met a young lady in the dining room at breakfast, and to our amusement, she had accepted his invitation to go out for dinner and drinks. Perry and Patch were always good company, but soon the blare of horns and the crush of people wore me down. It seemed that everywhere there were lights, and advertisements, and loud, raucous music.

When I fell into bed that night, I slipped into sleep quickly. I dreamed of grass that never ended, of wildebeest that floated in fog, of a sky so clear at night the stars were diamonds, and of a strain of music that sang to every being that lived..

The next morning in the studio, the film of the two starving cubs was played. I wanted to sink into my seat with embarrassment when I saw myself running to the cubs. I watched as Colin grabbed me and tried to reason with me. When he held me tightly from behind, the camera zoomed in on his face. And I saw what Perry had seen through his zoom lens, what I had been too angry to notice that night. Colin's eyes were moist with tears.

I sat up straight. He did care. He cared as much as I did. As I looked at him on the screen, I knew in a tenth of a nanosecond that I loved him. Madly. Jeez, Louise, and please, oh please help me, you mighty saints and angels. I was helplessly in love.

As we walked out of the studio for lunch, Howard teased me. "I love an objective writer."

"Oh, shut up. It's embarrassing enough without you rubbing it in. We can't use that film."

"Oh, yes we can. And we should."

"I made a fool of myself."

"I wouldn't call it being foolish. Just human," said Patch. He threw his arm around my shoulder and gave me a squeeze.

I lay my head briefly on his shoulder. "Thank you."

"Hey! Howard," joked Perry. "Do you want to tell Randi or should I?".

"Not me," said Howard.

"Knock it off, you guys," I said. But as we turned into a coffee shop, I found myself envious of Randi. I had no hope of Colin's loving me the way Patch loved Randi. Colin was married to his lions, his science. At least I had another month to be with him before filming was finished. That was something, at least. I wasn't sure, however, how I would react when I had to leave him for LA. Grief frightened me. It made me want to burrow myself into a safe, lonely place. My life had become very, very complicated

The next day, on our way back to Seronera, the bus couldn't move fast enough for me. The sundress I'd worn against the heat didn't help much. It was hot and muggy, and I was lonely for the land I'd come to love. Mostly, I was lonely for my scientist.

The bus pulled in just as the sun was sinking in the west. I stepped out, breathed deeply of the air, and smiled. Randi ran to meet us, gave Patch a hug, and said, "Some of the crew are going out with Colin tonight. They couldn't stand much more of the sitting around. He's leaving in a few minutes."

Perry, Patch, and I turned to Howard as a unit. "We're going out, too. You take the bags to the lodge." Howard saluted smartly.

I grabbed my messenger bag, and the three of us hurried down the path to Colin's house. The Land Rovers hadn't left for the field, yet. Perry and Patch joined their crews. I looked toward Colin's Land Rover, paused only briefly, and then hurried over to the passenger's side. Colin didn't say a word, just leaned over and opened the door. I climbed in. I was home.

I pulled the door shut and turned to see Colin looking at me, as only he can do. His eyes roamed, and rested on my bare shoulders. I realized that I still had on the breezy sundress I'd worn on the bus. It would be chilly when the sun went down. I didn't have a jacket, and I didn't care at all.

"Welcome home, Lionbait." Happy, happy me! "Glad to see you dressed for an evening of hard work." Even the sarcasm made me happy.

"I'll be OK. I didn't have time to change."

"You'll be cold."

I smiled. "If I am, you'll never know it. I'll be fine."

As we drove into the plains. Colin switched on his radio receiver to pick up the transmission from the Leo pride. Faintly, I heard the steady beep-beep-beep from the lioness. Colin stepped on the accelerator. His khaki pants couldn't hide the fact that Colin was more than happy to see me. I read that as a sign that said _Glad to see you, Lionbait._ Oh, I wouldn't be cold at all.

We drove for a long time until darkness had finally spread over the land. The Rover's headlights lit the road in front of us. Suddenly, Colin slammed on the brakes.

"What's wrong?" I asked, but as soon as I spoke, I saw what Colin had seen. A large male lion was crossing the road in front of us. In the headlights, I saw him turn toward us, hesitate a brief moment, then drop something from his mouth. He ambled across the road and vanished into the darkness of the night. Colin slowly lifted his foot off the brakes and inched forward. He stopped. He opened his door, got out, and walked over to the small heap in the road. He stood there for a long moment. He put his hands on his hips, then brushed both his hands through his hair. I knew instinctively that something was going on and that Perry was filming it.

I thought I saw a small movement from the little heap. At the same instant, Colin scooped up whatever the lion had been carrying and returned to the Land Rover with it. He handed me the tiny bundle without saying a word, turned the Land Rover abruptly around, passed the other two Land Rovers, and headed back to Seronera. In my lap was an emaciated, motionless, wet lion cub.

"It's one of your cubs," Colin said, his voice husky with emotion. I looked at him, but his eyes had already turned back to the road. I opened my mouth to speak, but raw emotion flooded through me. I knew my voice wouldn't work. Quickly wiping the tears from my eyes with the backs of my hands, I cuddled the tiny creature to me, wrapping him as best I could in the folds of my sundress.

Holding one hand on the wheel, Colin reached over to the backseat and grabbed his denim shirt. "Wrap him in that," he said. I did and held him against me, trying to warm him.

When we reached Colin's cabin, most of the crew returned to the lodge, but Perry and Patch followed us inside with their equipment to continue filming. As they set up, Colin grabbed a towel from the bathroom.

"Rub him with it," he said, tossing the towel to me. I sat on the couch with the cub on my lap, still wrapped in Colin's denim shirt. Colin went to the kitchen, set on a pot of water to heat, and came back into the living room where I was stroking the cub as gently as I could.

"No, no," Colin said. He took the cub and the towel from me. "Like a mother lion. Her tongue is big and rough." He rubbed the tiny creature vigorously with the towel. For a long time the only sound in the room was the camera. Colin said softly, "The other cub is probably dead. The mother, too."

I looked at him quickly and swallowed deeply to keep hold of my emotions. Colin handed me the cub and towel, and I continued to dry him off.

"It's pure coincidence we came upon him the way we did." He shook his head as if he were puzzled. "And that the male dropped him."

"What would he have done with it?"

"Eaten it," he replied. He turned away from the camera quickly and walked into the kitchen where the kettle had begun to boil. He returned with a small box and a hot water bottle wrapped in a towel. He lifted the cub out of my arms and snuggled it against the hot water bottle in the box.

He put his hands in his pockets and looked down at the cub. "I should have left him out there." He reached down briefly to scratch the cub behind the ear. When he went into the kitchen, Perry and Patch followed him with the camera and sound equipment. I walked to the door. Colin was digging around in his cupboard. He finally pulled out a can of infant formula.

"Why do you have formula in your cupboard?" I asked.

"Just in case," he replied. "I ordered it with weekly supplies once. You never know."

"I guess you don't."

He looked me straight in the eye. "Nothing is ever sure."

"Even if you don't like to interfere?"

"Even if you don't like to interfere." He poured some boiled water into a jar, measured out the proper amount of formula, stirred it, and put the jar into cold water so that it would cool to skin temperature. He took an eyedropper from a drawer, and tested the mixture on his arm. Then he took the jar and the eyedropper into the living room.

He took the cub onto his lap. "Come on, Ribs," he said quietly. "Let's have supper." With the eyedropper, Colin sucked up some formula and carefully squeezed it into the corner of the cub's mouth. He held the cub on his stomach and supported its head and neck as he dripped in the milk, drop by drop.

Over the next half hour, Colin managed to get an ounce into the youngster. I was surprised at how full the cub's tummy looked, even though his ribs still stuck out at the side. Ribs was a perfect name.

When Colin put Ribs back in the box, cuddled next to the hot water bottle, I saw the cub move ever so slightly in the direction of the warmth. It was the first movement I'd noticed since Colin had picked him up on the road.

I stood next to Colin and looked down at Ribs. Its fur was dry, and it stood out from his body. His face had the cutest, most helpless look I'd ever seen. His ears looked huge on top of his tiny face.

"You have your work cut out for you," I said. "I can help. And I'm sure Randi wouldn't mind babysitting in the office when you're in the field."

Colin reached down again and scratched the cub behind the ear. "What in heaven's name am I going to do with you, little guy?"

The rugged man I'd taken to be such a cold scientist looked the picture of compassion as he bent over the box and scratched behind the cub behind his ear. I couldn't take my eyes off him. I finally broke the silence. "What are you going to do with him?"

"I don't know," he replied. "He'd be dead by now, but I should have left him out there."

"Why didn't you?"

"I don't know," he replied as he straightened up. He turned and faced me, unaware of the camera. He thrust his hands in his pockets. My heart melted at the vulnerability that came through his eyes. "I guess it was the final straw, seeing that male lion drop him like that in the middle of the road." He paused for a long time, and then turned back to the cub. I could tell he was deeply troubled. "I shouldn't have interfered." His back was still to me.

"Why not? What's wrong with saving this baby?"

Colin turned to me. "Where do I draw the line? This cub, then one more, and, after that, ten more. Where do I draw the line?"

"I don't know," I said. "But for this one, it matters."

He just nodded. He turned to the darkness outside the front window. "But nature is good, too. And in the natural order cubs die, and old lions die, and a mother lion sometimes gets her jaw kicked in by a zebra. For years and years nature had dictated the order and she's done a good job without our interference."

"Are you sorry you picked up the cub?" I asked.

Colin glanced toward the box where the cub was asleep against the warmth, his tummy full of milk. "No," Colin said. "I'm not."

I heard the camera stop. Perry tucked the camera in its bag. Perry put away his sound equipment. "Thank you, Colin," he said and I could tell he'd been touched by what had happened. Patch didn't say a word, but he patted Colin on the back as he walked by him to the door. Perry turned back. "We'll want film on the cub tomorrow."

"I'll be here,"

Perry and Patch left, closing the door behind them. Colin looked at me. "Peanut butter sandwich?" Oh, yes. I wanted a peanut butter sandwich from this man.
Chapter 10

Colin put on a pot of coffee. I went to the kitchen door and leaned against the doorjamb. He pulled a loaf of bread out of the breadbox and a jar of peanut butter from the cupboard. I went to the refrigerator and found a jar of jam on the top shelf. I set it on the counter. Colin stood beside me, started to open the bread, stopped, and looked at me. He turned to me. "I..." his voice was thick with emotion. He tried again. "I wish..." He put his hands on my bare shoulders and moved them down my arms and back up again.

I reached my arms around his neck. "To tell the truth," I said, "I'm not really hungry for a peanut butter sandwich." I pulled his face down to mine and kissed him. My tongue explored before his tongue did, but when his did, I could tell he was as swept away as I was. His hands went to my shoulders and lowered the spaghetti straps on my dress. I pulled my arms out of the straps, and he reached behind me and unzipped the dress. It dropped to the floor and I was left standing in bra and a thong. Those actually stayed on for a while. Colin picked me up in his arms, I said, "The coffee," and he managed to turn off the burner without dropping me. I ended up on the bed, bra and thong intact, and he ended up on top of me, jeans straining to hold him in.

Oh, my goodness, he felt good on top of me. He rested his elbows on either side of my head and looked down into my eyes, his hands cupping the top of my head. He didn't say anything, just looked at me. He leaned down and gave me a gentle kiss He licked my lips, and then pulled my bottom lip very gently into his mouth. He kissed me softly again. Then his lips wanted more and his tongue got to work, and then he was nuzzling my ear, and my neck, and swell of my breasts, and they were asking for it, popping up above the bra like they were bragging.

Then a kiss, a long gentle kiss, and the bra came off, and the thong came off, and the jeans and t-shirt and boxers came off, and he was on top of me again, and I knew Colin wanted to be inside me. Ding-dong, someone at the door of City Hall, and someone coming in, and I could feel how big he was even just peeking in the door. He worked his way in slowly and gently. He waited, let me relax, and then continued slowly until he knew I could take all of him. Then, as demanding as he'd been gentle, he thrust his way home--as they say--to the hilt. And when he couldn't hold himself back anymore, I couldn't hold myself back either. We both--the first time we'd made love--shot off our fireworks together.

For a long time he lay on top of me, and then he pulled out and rolled off of me, and pulled me against him. I lay my head on his shoulder and threw my leg over him and we fell sound asleep. I awoke once in the darkness. He was asleep, but his hand had strayed to one of my breasts, cupping me softly. I drifted off again.

I woke up before the sun was up. He was no longer in bed. I could hear him in the kitchen, mixing up the formula for Ribs. I pulled on my bra and thong, looked around for my dress, remembered it was in the kitchen, and went into the living room, just as Colin was coming out of the kitchen with a jar of formula and the eyedropper to feed Ribs. He'd pulled on his jeans, but not his shirt. His hair was mussed. He glanced at me, looked up and down the length of me, and grinned. He leaned toward me and kissed me. "Good morning, Lionbait."

"Me, too," I said. I went into the kitchen, saw that he'd put my dress over the back of the kitchen chair, and I pulled it on. I couldn't reach the zipper in back. I'd had to ask Howard to zip it up for me in Nairobi. I wandered into the living room and curled up on the couch next to Colin and Ribs. I leaned my head on his shoulder as he fed the cub.

"I'm going into the field after I feed him. Will you ask Randi if she'd mind coming down here and I'll show her what to do?"

"Sure. I'll run up and get her now." I stood up and started for the door.

"Zipper," he called after me.

Oops! "Would you, please?"

He set Ribs back in the box, and I turned my back to him. He reached inside my dress from behind and softly ran his hands up my abdomen to my breasts. He cupped them in his hands, and I lay my head back against him. "I have to work," I said. "And you have to finish feeding Ribs."

"I know," he said. He lowered my bra.

"We have to work," I repeated, but less emphatically.

He nuzzled my neck. "I know," he whispered against my skin. And that was that. Before I knew it, I was on my back on the couch, my thong was off and across the room somewhere, and his jeans were off. The bra stayed on, safely tucked below the ladies, the dress was lifted to my waist, and he was on top of me and inside of me. And off we went to the races right there on the couch with Ribs a witness to it all. Colin did pause at one point, strong and hard inside me, and looked into my eyes. "What's your full name?"

And in my thoroughly pinned down, couldn't-get-away-if-I-wanted-to position, I told the truth. "Cinnamon Sugar Wyatt hyphen Jones." He didn't laugh. I swear he didn't. He did grin, and he covered my mouth with his and kissed me slowly and deeply. It was actually a really neat moment. Who knew my name could call up such tenderness? And then bye-bye tenderness, hello Mr. I-Claim-You. And off we went again, and in the end, I claimed him right back.

He lay on top of me when we were finished. He wanted to stay in me. I wanted the same thing. He lifted himself up on his elbows and looked down into my eyes, and a minute passed, then two, and then five or six. "We have to work," I whispered.

"I know." Ribs got antsy, and Colin looked over at him. "I guess we shouldn't be doing this in front of the kid." Slowly, slowly he pulled out, and we got professional again, except for his Denise-the-Menace moment when he tweaked my nipples for good luck as he pulled my bra back up over the ladies.

I retrieved my thong from under his desk. He pulled his jeans back on. I lowered my sundress from its naughty position up around my waist to its proper position just above my knees. I sat beside him, turned my back to him and said "Zipper." He zipped me up, and kissed my neck, and turned me toward him, and we did the tongues in mouth thing, and he reached behind me, unzipped he dress--deja vu--and he lowered his head and showered warm kisses all over my neck. And then he reached behind me and zipped my dress up again. We kissed, but we both pulled away at the same time. And we both cleared our throats at the same time, and both said, not quite, but almost in unison, "Work. Ribs"

I grabbed my messenger bag and headed out the door. "See you in a bit," I called back. I closed the door behind me. I could still feel him. Every step I took, I knew he'd been inside me. That got me, all right. It stirred me up. I knew I needed to turn back into a professional, so I tried to put him out of my mind. Work. Lions. Documentary. Professional writer.

Randi was still in our room. I told her about Ribs, and said that Colin asked if she'd babysit the cub in the office, and that he wanted her to come down and he'd show her how to feed him and mix the formula. She headed out the door. I took a quick shower and dressed in shorts and a khaki shirt. Nothing sexy. The thong and the lacy bra, of course, fresh and pink. When I pulled up the thong and settled the straps around my waist, I was full of the feeling of him and all woman on the inside. On the outside, I was all khaki. In my tiredness, I double-checked everything. Buttoned up and ready to go. All business.

We were in the field all day. When we were heading back to Seronera, I began to drift off. The two days in Nairobi, the bus ride back, the emotion of finding Ribs, and the long, physical--and I mean physical--night had done me in. I fell asleep in the Land Rover. Colin and I went up to the office, but Randi had already gone to our room, so he picked up Ribs there. He gave me a peck on the cheek and said goodnight. I hate to admit it, but I was so darn tired, I was glad. I was asleep before my head hit my pillow.
Chapter 11

I woke up early the next morning. Our days took on a pleasant routine. Breakfast, travel out to the field, Randi babysitting in the day, filming, writing in the evening, and a week passed with all of us, including Dr. Colin McCullough and Cinnamon Sugar Wyatt hyphen Jones, acting thoroughly professional. Truth be told, we were tired. Colin would kiss me and say goodnight after he picked up Ribs. I have a feeling getting up in the middle of the night to feed the cub was taking its toll on him. I could have spent the night and helped, but then neither of us would have gotten any sleep. So, chasteness was the order of the day and the night.

When Colin and I walked into the office a week later, we heard Howard complaining, "We're not running a babysitting service." He reached to lift Ribs off his chair, set him on the floor, and tried to sit down to work while the cub wrestled with the cuff on his pants.

Randi laughed out loud. Everyone on the film crew, and Howard was no exception, was thrilled with the cub's comeback. He grew chubbier and chubbier. Even his ears, once so huge atop his head, seemed to be more in proportion with his cute face.

Ribs seemed to especially love Colin. When he came in from the field to the office or to our room to pick him up, Ribs ran to him and tried to crawl up his legs to be held. The affection was mutual. When Colin held Ribs, a softness came into his eyes. I loved that looked and I loved him. My life had been so much simpler before I realized how much I was in love with Colin. Our time in the Serengeti would soon be over. I would leave. Colin would stay. I had no idea what would happen after that, no idea what my reaction would be.

I was beginning to wonder if I had all that I wanted for the film. We had three weeks left. Only three. And I was not sure I even knew what I wanted. I tried again and again to write narrative that would make sense of the lioness with the broken jaw. And all I did was delete, delete, delete on my laptop.

Breakfast time again. Still in the routine. I slipped into a pair of blue jeans and a khaki shirt. I went to the dining room, and before I had a chance to pour myself a cup of coffee, I heard Howard calling me over. I walked to his table and he started in on me. "What's happening with the NASA film we rented. And what about the lion with the broken jaw. You keep saying you want to do something with that, but what? How? What do we need to film before we leave?"

I held up my hands in defense. "Don't push me Howard." I didn't mean to sound angry, but I think I did. I took a deep breath. "What did you do yesterday? Pay bills?"

"No, I didn't pay bills, yesterday." He sounded gruff.

"Then what gives?"

"I want to know what we have to film. We only have three weeks left. I want to know what the arc of this documentary is. I don't want to find out we don't have what we need when we're editing back in LA."

"I know."

"Cinn..."

I felt strangely vulnerable. "Would you mind if I took a day off?"

"That's not what we're talking about. Don't get me off the subject." I could tell he wasn't playing.

"I'm not trying to get you off the subject. I need to get away, to think." I looked into Howard's eyes, wishing I could explain how I felt. I felt drawn to something, but I didn't know what. "Let me take a Land Rover tomorrow. I'll be back by evening."

Howard leaned toward me. "Back from where?"

"I don't know." I reached and patted his hand. "Trust me."

"I always do," he said. "It's just that I get ulcers in the meantime."

I leaned across to him and kissed him on the cheek. I whispered, "Does that mean I get a Land Rover and a day to myself."

"Yes." He sighed. "But let me know where you are going. And come back with something." He looked at the many small scratches Ribs had made along his arms. "And I don't mean with a lion cub."

That made me laugh. I went to the serving table, scooped up some eggs, got a piece of toast, and returned to eat with Howard.

When we got back to Seronera from the field that evening, I told Colin I wouldn't be going out with him the next day. I had something to do. He asked me what, but I just shrugged. Even I didn't know, yet.

That evening I spread my large map of the Serengeti National Park on my bed, trying to figure out where it was that I wanted to go the next day. I wanted some place where I could think and hopefully come up with answers for the documentary. I'd love to see Lake Victoria, but realized that wasn't the place I needed to go. I looked at the black lines that represented the rivers, following them to the east. And then my eyes landed on the words _Olduvai Gorge_. That was it. I didn't know why, but that was where I needed to go.

"Howard will kill me," I said out loud. I left my room and walked down the veranda that surrounded the lodge to Howard's room. I knocked on the door. He answered in an old baggy sweater, smoking a pipe. No reason to beat around the bush. "I'm going to Olduvai Gorge."

He stared at me a minute like I had donkeys for eyeballs. He took the pipe out of his mouths. "What?"

"I'm going to Olduvai Gorge for my day off."

"I thought you wanted to think about the film."

"I do. That's where I can think."

"It's not a film about archeology and old bones. It's about..."

"Lions," I interrupted. "I know. Trust me."

"Don't you think it would be more helpful to sit under an acacia tree with some lions?" He was honestly bewildered.

"It's larger than that. Just trust me." When he didn't answer, I begged, "Please."

Howard shook his head at my persistence. He placed a hand firmly on my shoulder. "Go, but come back with answers." I reached up to hug him. "Answers," he said gruffly. "Come back with answers. And be careful."

I hurried down the veranda and ducked into my room. I sat down at my small desk to work and felt an electric excitement, as if everything would soon come together.

The following morning I took a quick shower, slipped into a cool white blouse and a pair of jeans, grabbed a quick breakfast and a couple of sandwiches the kitchen had made for me, and assured Randi I would be back by 5:00. She made me pinky-swear, and I did. I headed out early toward the southeast border of the Serengeti National Park. As the sun peeked above the horizon, I stopped the Land Rover. I was treated to a primeval scene as the sun began to play off the dewdrops on the endless green blades of grass, lighting the miles in front of me as if with fairy lights.

I started the Land Rover again and drove into the sunlit plains, knowing I would find what I needed at the end of my trip, that somehow Olduvai Gorge held for me the secrets I needed to learn in order for me to translate onto the screen the reality I'd learned about the lion's life.

After driving for quite a while, I stopped to rest my eyes. I poured myself a cup of coffee from the thermos. As I sipped it by the side of the road, I enjoyed the silence around me. On the far horizon, I thought I saw clouds building up, but for now the sun bathed the land in morning light. I finished my coffee and on my way.

Five minutes later, I allowed my attention--and the rational part of my brain--to be diverted by a pair of the smallest hoof stock animals I'd ever seen. I stopped the Land Rover as the animals crossed in front on me. They couldn't weigh more than ten pounds each. Barely more than a foot high, they looked like wind-up toys. I reached for my animal guidebook on the seat beside me and quickly thumbed through the pages until I came upon a picture resembling the animals. "Dik-dik," I said out loud. I glanced to my right where the animals had just disappeared in the distance. Almost unconsciously, I turned my Land Rover off the road to follow them.

Their tiny bodies and their graceful movements were enchanting. I wished Perry and his camera were along. Many things were written about big animals, about elephants and lions and giraffes, but I couldn't help thinking about how wonderful it would be to have a documentary about the dik-dik, or a photo book, or a children's book. In my mind, I turned over ideas for titles, not paying a bit of attention to my surroundings, as I continued to follow the little creatures: _Giant Land's Tiny Creatures,_ or _The Dik-Dik: Toys in a Giant Land_. In the distance I saw the thick foliage of the Mbalageti River and I realized the dik-dik were heading for the water.

As they neared the banks of the river, I pulled up as close as I could to them without frightening them. I felt the Land Rover sink a bit in the soft ground, but was so lost in thought I paid little attention. I stood up through the sunroof and watched the dik-dik for fifteen minutes as they skillfully balanced on their slender legs on the banks of the river and sipped at the cool water. They were alert to any predator that might be in the area. Their large ears twitched and turned, as if to pick up the slightest noise. They lifted their heads frequently to look around cautiously. I'd learned in my research that watering spots were the most dangerous places for prey animals. Large predators could hide easily in the lush foliage that was beside the water.

I looked up from the dik-dik at the green that bordered the river. The sun cut through the trees in shafts and dappled the river water. I knew that I wanted Perry to come out to film the dik-dik, and I hoped we would be lucky enough to see them again.

Finally the two little animals walked up the bank of the river and disappeared in the dense foliage. I sat back down and glanced at my watch. I was shocked. It was nearly eleven o'clock. It had been over three hours since I'd first stopped for coffee.

I'd wanted a long time at Olduvai Gorge, but I'd promised Randi I'd be back by five o'clock. That wouldn't leave me much time. "Why don't I ever think?" I said out loud. I was disgusted with myself.

I turned the key in the ignition, put the vehicle in reverse, and stepped on the gas. The wheels spun but took me nowhere. They were having way too much fun spitting up mud. The Land Rover and I didn't move an inch.

Oops! Seriously Oops! I took a deep breath. I told myself that I'd gotten out of muddy spots before, even icy spots, and I could do it again. I tried to rock the Rover out by putting it quickly from forward to reverse and back again. But the wheels, despite all my effort, no matter what I tried, stayed stuck.

I looked at my watch again. Ten minutes had passed. If five o'clock came and went, they wouldn't even know where to look for me. They thought I was going to Olduvai Gorge. I'd turned off the road--off the road, mind you--and I was stuck in the mud by the river. Guilty, totally guilty of stupid.

The thought of spending a night by myself on the Serengeti frightened me. I slammed the vehicle in reverse and pushed the accelerator to the floor. Useless, but I couldn't help myself. I held it down for a full minute. No forward movement, but I did manage to settle the Rover deeper into the mud.

Finally, I turned the motor off. My hands were trembling. Yep, I was scared. Why had I turned off the road? I took out my cell phone. Not a single bar. Not one. I made a mental note to change carriers when I got back to the States, as if that were the root of my problem. Why had I let my over-active mind muddy the path I'd laid out for myself for the day.

The Land Rover wasn't going anywhere. I sat behind the wheel, staring at the green foliage before me and at the cool water of the river. Only a moment ago, it had all seemed so magical. Now it was terrifying. And then the word _traction_ popped into my head. Green foliage meant potential traction. I opened the door and said to the surrounding ecosystem, "I have to get out of here."

When I stepped onto the soft ground, I sank up to my ankles in mud. And to make a bad situation worse, I could not pull my heavy hiking boots out. The more I tried to pull them up, the more the mud sucked them down. I mean what kind of physics is that? What's the equation for that? OK, I knew that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. I pulled up, the mud pulled down. But if I pushed down on the boots, I sure as hell knew the mud wasn't going to push them up to me. How was that fair? Curses on my useless eleventh grade physics class. I paused. I gave myself a mental slap on the back of the head. I was already losing my grip, and my survival adventure had just begun.

I slipped my feet out of the boots and down they sank into the mud. My socks sucked up so much mud that when I when I managed to pull my feet out, the socks stayed behind. Make an equation for that, Cal Tech! My feet actually slurped when I pulled them out. It was sink and slurp, sink and slurp, all the way over to the trees and bushes.

I gathered an armful of branches, sticks, and anything I could find to wedge under the tires. I was thinking--thinking, mind you--of my new favorite word _traction_. I slurped my way back to the Rover, wedged my foliage under the tires, slurped my way back to the driver's side, paused briefly, got back in, and turned on the ignition. The Rover didn't budge. This time the wheels spit out both mud and my beloved traction.

"If at first you don't succeed..." talked its way into my scared little brain like a magazine salesman. I got out of the Rover and slurped my way back to the trees and bushes and picked myself up and dusted myself off and started all over again. I ranged farther away. I spotted a pile of bigger branches around a log. Slurp, slurp, slurp. I reached to pick up some of the branches when the large log I had seen morphed into a crocodile. He opened his huge, toothy mouth and snapped at my hand, its five fingers delicate and lovely in the Serengeti air. SCREAM an immediate retraction of hand. The crocodile stood up on his silly, little legs and took a lumbering step toward me. I turned and sink-slurp-ran back to the Land Rover, accompanied by a drumbeat that was my adrenaline-driven heart. I looked over my shoulder to see if the crocodile had followed me. He hadn't. He had probably eaten a dik-dik earlier, the bastard, and wasn't hungry.

I leaned against the Rover door and took a number of deep breaths. I had to make a decision. I could stay in the Rover and hope against hope that I'd be found. I could keep trying the traction thing. Or, I could try to hike out.

Because I still had the sticks and branches from my crocodile trip to the river, I pried them under the wheels. I tried once more to drive the Rover out of the mud, but my attempt, though eminently valiant, was useless.

I knew I had to resign myself to my stuck-it-ness, so I did. I took my bearings. I repeat that I was nowhere that anyone could find me. No, I did not follow my route. Yes, I was off the beaten path. I had two sandwiches, a half thermos of coffee, and two gallons of water in the back. Yes, I was scared. This was way worse than my fruit-of-the-loom folly in first grade.

While recouping my optimism after Mr. Crocodile and my second failed traction attempt, I thought back to my forgotten Tuesday fruit-of-the-looms adventure. It was a breezy day and I knew recess would be a peep show directed my way. So I called Mrs. Meno's name loudly after language arts, only I said Mrs. Meanie instead. I had purposefully broken rule number one on the "Classroom Expected Behavior" chart. I think the rule was "Say each person's name properly." It might have been "Show respect." It didn't matter. I knew what I was breaking the rule, however, even at six years old. I was put in time-out on the bench during recess. Sat quietly, hands in lap, and thought about my crime. Easy Peazy, as far I was concerned. Dress stayed down. Peep show cancelled for the duration.

All of that aside, I was still stuck in the mud. I had only two choices left. I could stay in the Land Rover, and I knew I probably should. Do give me credit for that bit of wisdom. But my chances of being found were slim. Nobody knew where I was. I didn't even know where I was. If I could get to the road, I'd be found eventually. However, it might be a big, bad animal rather than a vehicle that came upon me. That scared me a lot. That made me take out my cell phone again and check for coverage. No bars. We all know how that feels. I mean, Jeez! my carrier couldn't even scare up a half bar for me. And then there's the amount I pay to the company for _Good Coverage_ (my italics for sarcastic emphasis). I was in a national park, for crying out loud, and I couldn't get bars. OK, my thoughts were flailing around, I was angry at cell phone bars. I. Had. To. Get. A. Grip.

I made the decision, finally, to try to hike to the road. When I got out of the Land Rover, sinking to my ankles again, I tried once more to pull my boots out of the mud. No luck. My thoughts flailed about and I got angry all over again with the laws of physics. I'd told my father that physics would never help me in life. I was right. He still insisted I take it. I got an A, but if you considered my current situation it was like having an A in astrology. It was not going to help me. I tried leveraging the boots out with one of the sturdy branches. No luck. Physics again. _Give me a lever and I can move the world._ Remember that! Easy if the world's in space, but no way is it going to move if it's stuck in the mud! I could not get my boots out. Strongest mud I've ever met in my life.

I walked away from the Rover, my bare feet thick with mud. It was a very brave or very scared me that said out loud, "I never wore shoes when I was a kid, and I don't have to now." I had put the sandwiches in the messenger bag and left everything else behind except the bag and a gallon of water.

I headed in a direction away from the dense overgrowth that lined the river until I was looking out toward the endless grassy reaches of the Serengeti plains. I looked up at the sky and judged that I had quite a few hours before darkness.

As I walked, I realized that I had not paid any attention to where I was going when I followed the dik-dik. My mind had been on words and books and the arc of the documentary. I stopped and shook my head. If Colin were here, he'd have a thing or two to say about my lack of common sense. I vowed, quietly but emphatically, to keep this day a secret from him. I took a deep breath, pointed myself away from the river, and started walking.

Three hours later, the sun was still high in the sky. Perspiration dripped into my eyes and down my back. Colin's words came at me like a warning. "Human beings aren't considered prey unless they appear tired or sick." I held my head high, walking as vigorously as my bare feet would allow. I wanted to look like healthy _homo sapiens_ with important places to go.

It was difficult. Small bristles and pebbles had already cut into my feet, and walking was an effort. I tried to sing to myself, but my mouth was full of cotton. I knew I should eat at least half a sandwich, but I wasn't hungry. I lifted the gallon jug to my mouth and took a drink. I had to stay hydrated. I hummed for a while, and then tried to at least keep the tunes in my head. Within another hour, however, I was only repeating left, right, left, right, as I stumbled through the grassy plains.

I began to despair of ever finding the road, and then, I took a step and felt an excruciating pain in my right foot. I collapsed. Fighting back tears, I sat up, looked at the bottom of my foot and saw blood streaming out of a deep cut. I tried to wipe the blood away, but my hand was filthy and I only succeeded in rubbing dirt into the wound. Unable to hold back tears any longer, I gave myself a break and cried. And then it was time to stop crying and get serious about survival.

I knew I had to protect my foot and try to stop the bleeding. I took off my white blouse, rolled it so that it was a long, bandage type of thing, and, after dumping some water over my foot to clean it, I wrapped my jury-rigged bandage around it and tied it tightly.

There was me, wandering in the marvelous ecosystem that is the Serengeti, in my jeans, bare feet, and a bra. I didn't care. I knew I had to take care of my foot. And anyway, dress code had always been a foreign language to me. I tried, but I always got the conjugations wrong. I thought of my grandmother, and gave a little laugh. Somehow, I felt comforted.

With effort I stood up and began walking again. I realized I was limping badly. The sight of the old zebra that had been killed by the lions on my first night out with Colin, flashed through my mind. "Don't let a lion see me," I prayed. I fought the pain in my foot and tried to walk evenly on it, tried desperately not to limp. Again, tears streamed down my face. That was about the time I realized I should never have left the Land Rover.

I turned in a complete circle, but no longer knew where the Land Rover might be. A breeze cooled my cheeks. I glanced at the sky. The huge black and purple thunderheads were building in the sky. It smelled like rain. I tried to swallow, but couldn't. I took another drink of water. I knew I had to keep my wits about me. I might survive if I didn't let fear get the best of me.

I didn't see any animals or birds. Nothing. Just sky and grass and me. I felt like I was the only creature on earth. Loneliness held me like a straitjacket. My breath came in short, raspy gasps. Then I felt my left foot twist on a rock. I fell. Instantly, I knew that I'd sprained my ankle.

I heard thunder. I staggered to my feet, but could barely walk. A jagged streak of lightning ripped across the sky. I still had brains enough to know that I needed to get down and stay down. I dropped face down in the grass and buried my head in my arms. The rain fell in huge drops that beat down on my back. It rained and rained until I was soaked to the skin.

The storm finally passed. I stood up. I had to keep going. I had to get to the road before dark. I took a drink of water. I gritted my teeth and began walking. The ground was soggy. Time and again I fell, splashing mud in my eyes. "Steady," I said out loud. I had to be steady. I stopped and looked around to get my bearings. With horror, I saw the foliage of the trees beside the river in the distance. I was walking back toward the river! I panicked. There wasn't a road. There had to be a road. I heard my voice yelling, "Where's the road?" I fell to the ground and I must have passed out because a while later something deep inside me ordered me wake up.

Thirty feet from me stood two lions, cocking their heads quizzically. I stumbled to my feet. I didn't want to die. Not this way. "Don't run," my mind screamed. I tried to stand steady, not to sway, not to give any evidence of helplessness. I clapped my hands once, twice, three times, and the lions slowly turned and ambled away.

"Lionbait finally remembers to clap and Dr. Colin McCullough isn't here to see it," I said out loud. My voice was hoarse. I tried to take a deep breath, but it made me cough. I doubled over, tears spilling down my cheeks from the pain. I thought of Colin.

Colin. I stood up straight. Common Sense. And suddenly I felt calm. If I could conquer my emotions, I could figure out what to do. I had spent months studying maps before I'd even come to the Serengeti. And I had spent intense weeks in the field. I knew what it looked like. I knew where the road was in relation to Nyaraswiga Hill and in relation to the river. I knew how the land spread out and where east and west were, north and south. The storm was over, the sun was back, and I could judge its position in the sky. It was headed west. I just needed to keep my bearings.

I hobbled away from the river, trying to go in a straight line. I looked over my shoulder toward the river, now and then, and judged its angle with the sun. I kept walking, knowing the sun was setting toward the west, looking toward the foliage of the river behind me. I kept walking and walking, and finally, far in the distance, I could see the shimmering purple of Nyaraswiga Hill. From Colin's porch, it stood far to the left and yet parallel to the road. I tried to figure out, by the setting sun, the distant hill, and the river, where the road would be, the road that left Seronera and went straight into the plains. I stood calmly until I knew which way to go. I should bear to the left slightly, keeping the sun to my right shoulder. I continued to walk. I refused to give in to the pain in my feet. Every few steps, I stopped and took my bearings. And I took small sips of water. If I didn't panic, if I took my time, I could make it. I knew I could make it.

Darkness had engulfed the Serengeti when I finally reached the road. I smiled briefly, then felt my strength give out. I collapsed and blacked out.

When I felt myself being lifted up, I opened my eyes. Colin had me in his arms. "Hi, Lionbait," he said. "I see you lost your shirt." I smiled and closed my eyes. I remembered little, except being held in his lap, wrapped warmly in his jacket, as Randi drove the Land Rover that took me home to his cabin.
Chapter 12

I woke up in Colin's bed. He was sitting beside the bed, holding my hand. I winced when a pain stabbed through my foot.

"Sorry, young lady," said an elderly man who was working on my feet.

"This is Dr. Brooks," said Colin. "Randi called him when we brought you in."

When I heard Colin's voice, I tried to sit up but fell back on the pillows. "What happened?"

"That's what we were going to ask you," Colin said.

I winced again. "No stitches needed," said Dr. Brooks. "But you're going to have to soak your feet a good deal to keep down infection and help them heal."

Randi came into the bedroom with a cup of tea. "Ah, she wakes!" she said. "How are you feeling, Cinn?"

"I've felt better." I tried to smile. I was tired, and my whole body hurt, but I was thankful to be alive and safe.

Dr. Brooks finished at my feet. He came to the head of the bed and felt my forehead. "You have a slight fever. If it goes any higher," he said turning to Colin, "bathe her with cool water." He felt the glands in my neck. "She's probably going to come down with a cold, too." He looked down at me. "Drink a lot of fluids, and you can have aspirin if the pain is too much."

"Thanks, Doctor," I said.

"I'll stop in tomorrow to see how you're doing." Colin walked him through the living room and saw him out.

Randi propped the pillows behind me and helped me sit up. My blanket slipped down. Yep, not a stitch. Randi pulled the blanket up and tucked it under my arms. She handed me the tea, and I sipped it gratefully.

"I need some clothes," I whispered to her. "Could you bring me some?"

"Already did. On the dresser." She pointed to a little pile of neatly folded clothes.

Colin returned to the room. "No need for both of us to lose sleep, Randi. I can take over from here."

"I don't mind staying."

"I know you don't. I can handle it. You've had a big day, too."

"How about if I pick up Ribs from Howard and take him to my room for the night."

"Deal. Formula's in the kitchen."

There was a knock on the door. Randi opened it, and Howard stepped in, cuddling Ribs. "Wrecked the office," he said matter-of-factly. Colin took him from his arms, and Randi went in the kitchen to get the formula.

Howard walked over and sat on the bed beside me. "Are you OK, Cinn?"

"I'm fine." My voice was raspy, but my smile was real.

"You had us all worried to death."

"I was worried myself." I took a sip of tea. "I was going to Olduvai Gorge for the day..."

"I know that," Howard interrupted. "But you didn't." I could see that he was genuinely upset.

"I'm sorry. Please don't be angry." I reached my hand out and he took it in both of his. "I saw two of the most enchanting little creatures and I followed them to the river."

"Without thinking..."

"I was thinking..."

"And if I know you, you were thinking about how they could be used in a documentary, or in a book, or whatever the hell it is you let you mind wander away to."

I clamped my mouth shut. He was so totally right! I took a sip of tea. In the living room, Colin handed Ribs to Randi, and he opened the door for her. When he returned, he stood in the door of his bedroom, leaning against the doorjamb, his arms crossed on his chest.

"Cinn, you've got to use a little common sense now and then," said Howard.

"You sound like my grandmother." I sat up abruptly and the blanket slipped to my waist. Oops. I tugged it quickly to my neck with one hand, not very successfully, trying to balance the cup of tea with my other hand. "Howard, I don't need a lecture from you. And thank you for averting your eyes." I continued to try to adjust the blanket and finally I handed him the cup. "Here," I said. "Hold this for me." I secured the blanket up under my arms again.

Colin walked over to the bed. "She does need a lecture on common sense..."

"Oh, shut up," I said.

"But right now she needs some sleep."

"She'll be OK?" Howard asked, his anger rapidly disappearing.

"Dr. Brooks says she'll be fine. She may develop a fever tonight, so he wants her to rest here because of the kitchen. I'll sleep on the couch."

Howard shook his hand. "Thanks for taking care of her." He looked down at me then. He shook his head, leaned down, and kissed me on the forehead. "Don't ever scare me again."

"I'll try," I said. And I meant it.

Colin took the cup of tea from him and showed him to the door. When he came back in the bedroom, he sat on the side of the bed and handed me the cup. "Drink up."

I took the tea and sipped it. The blanket slipped down to my waist again. Colin lifted it up and tucked it under my arms. He felt my forehead. "Your fever seems to have gone down. Randi and I washed you down with cool water when we got you here. Seems to have helped."

I just nodded. I wasn't even awake to be embarrassed by it. I finished the tea. Colin took the cup and stood up. "I'll sleep on the couch. Call out if you need me."

I didn't want to be alone, not after feeling so lonely when I was lost on the Serengeti. I reached my hand to stop him. The blanket fell again to my waist, but I didn't care. "Don't go. Sleep here. I'll scoot over so you have room. I don't want to be alone."

"Cinn..."

Tears came to my eyes. "I was so alone."

"Cinn, I don't want to hurt you."

"You won't." I took a deep breath. "It's my feet that hurt and I'll just keep them out of your way. We'll just sleep. I promise." He stood over the bed, and looked at me. "Please," I said. "I don't want to be alone."

He went into the living room and turned off the lantern. Back in the bedroom, he turned the lantern down low. I looked at him as he pulled off his t-shirt. He unzipped his jeans and pulled them off. Commando.

He pulled back the covers and crawled in beside me. He moved as far away from me as possible, but I wanted human contact. I snuggled over close to him, turned on my side with my back to him and curled up. He turned to me, put his arm around my waist, pulled me up close to him, and we spooned. I felt safe. And I felt connected. The loneliness I'd felt on the Serengeti drifted out of me, and I fell into a sound sleep. I woke up a few hours later. Colin was breathing the deep breath of sleep, and he was still spooned tightly against me. Again I fell asleep.

It was beginning to get light when I woke up again. Colin's hand was cupping my breast, and he wasn't asleep. Two ways I could tell he was awake. He was having trouble not massaging my breast and he was in at-alert, male, morning mode. There was hardly enough room in the bed for the three of us.

I pretended to be asleep. I knew he didn't want to wake me by getting out of bed, and I didn't want him to get out of bed. I'd had something to eat, I'd had some tea, I'd had medicine put on my feet by a doctor, I'd had some sleep, and I was feeling way better than I had the day before. In fact, I was quite happy.

He stirred and swelled a bit more gainst me. Colin was having trouble with gentlemanly control because he began playing with my nipple. Then he came to his senses and pulled his hand away from my breast all together. I, meanwhile, was having a hell of a good time.

I pushed back against him and moaned a little bit as if in sleep. Colin got harder. His bad-boy hand strayed back to my breast but tried to control itself. No luck. Nipple got hard. I moved, as if in a dream.

And then I turned--still fake-asleep--and cuddled into him and accidentally-on-purpose let my hand fall nonchalantly on His Majesty. And I let my hand accidentally-on-purpose grab hold and hang on. I don't know if Colin still believed my sleep ruse, but I kept it up. My eyes were closed. I was having a bit of trouble keeping my breathing realistic, but I think he believed I was asleep. No, he couldn't have.

He gently pushed my hair out of my eyes. He laid his hand on my cheek. There I was, happy and not alone on the Serengeti. I was curious to see where this would go. And--OK--I was turned on. After all of yesterday's trauma, my hurt feet, my fear? Yep, I was turned on. He reached for my breast again. Honestly, it didn't take him long to climax. He pulled away from me, leaned his head back, and groaned as I brought him to a happy, morning moment.

When he was finished, he gently lifted my hand and kissed the palm. Then, he latched back on to my my breast, and his hand slid down, and I was wet and willing to have him enter me with one finger, then two and he brought me to my own happy morning moment.

We cuddled each other, my head on his shoulder, my hand on his chest, and we actually did, for reals (as they say in middle school) fall asleep. And that's my good morning story and its pleasant ending to a scary adventure. He felt warm and strong, and I felt so very, very safe.
Chapter 13

I stayed two more nights. I actually only needed to stay one more night, but we were having too much fun. I did work, propped in bed or on the couch while I soaked my feet. I called Perry down and told him about the river and the dik-diks. He took a crew out with Patch that afternoon.

And that night we spooned and fell asleep and _didn't_ wake up and we pretended to sleepwalk through a climax, or two, or three. I think we were both wearing each other out, but bodies sure can be fun, can't they?

The final night of my recovery and our three-night slumber party, Colin surprised me by paying homage to my name. He apparently found cinnamon and sugar in the kitchen cupboard. When he carried me to the bed from the couch, I saw that he'd spread towels on the bed. Hmmmm, I thought. What new dreams would I have tonight?

Colin slid off my shorts, lifted off my top, unsnapped my bra, and scooted my thong down over my feet. It disappeared across the room. He spread my legs apart, knelt between then, lifted my knees, and Holy Bejoley, downtown central was transformed into cinnamon sugar feast. Thank you, mother, for the odd, yet wonderful performance art in the delivery room and for my super name. And let me add, that cinnamon sugar sprinkled on Colin's tongue gave an extraordinary, granulated hello-and-how-do-you-do to my nipples. Then it was downtown again, and Whoa, Nelly, big city fireworks on the Fourth of July.

My turn, Buster. I sprinkled cinnamon sugar on my tongue, showed It what a granulated lollipop experience was like, and what it was like to have both cinnamon sugar and Cinnamon Sugar paying such loving attention to His Majesty. We finally ended up in the tub. He'd carried me and lowered me into the water. And then he climbed in behind me, and we spooned in there until the water turned cool. We drained the tub, filled it again-- yes, we wasted water, cut us some slack--and we washed all that sticky, cinnamon sugar off of us and enjoyed washing each other for quite some time.

He dried off and then reached down and lifted me out. Jeez, he was strong. He set me on a towel that was spread out on the couch. I dried off while he changed the sheets, bagged them, and set them on the porch so we wouldn't attract insects. Then he carried me to bed for our final slumber party. I mean, honestly folks, bodies really can be fun, can't they?

The next day Randi brought down a crutch she'd managed to scare up. I was able to put weight on my left foot, even though it had a slight sprain. I'd need to stay off my right foot until the cut healed. Dr. Brooks had looked at it twice, given me some fresh bandages, some antiseptic, and told me I'd be fine. I do know I probably had a healthy glow about me.

Randi carried my things up to the room. Colin and I slowly followed behind. Slumber party was over. We'd forgotten to order pizza and play Monopoly, but I didn't care a bit. It was the best slumber party I'd ever been to. Colin kissed me at the door, and headed back to his cabin. Soon I heard his Land Rover start up and he was heading into the field.

After my adventure, had to dig in and work. We only had ten days left. I still wanted to go to Olduvai Gorge, and I did, two days later when my cut had healed sufficiently, and I could put pressure on the foot. I told only Randi. She begged me not to go, but I was going, and nothing was going to stop me. I snuck away at night because I wanted to see the sun rise. I promised her I'd return by lunch. She was not to tell a single person, or I wouldn't be her maid of honor. We did the pinky-swear thing. I knew I had to keep my senses about me this time because I didn't want her to get into trouble.

I studied the map carefully because I knew I'd be driving in the dark. I filled a couple of gallon jugs with water, filled two thermos jugs with coffee, ordered a couple of sandwiches from the kitchen, and, bless their hearts, they threw in a bag of homemade cookies.

In the middle of the night, I woke Randi to tell her I was ready to go. She helped me carry the supplies to the Rover. I hugged her and whispered, "Cover for me tomorrow morning." She nodded, and I climbed in, turned on the ignition, and drove out of Seronera. The moon was full, so navigation was easier than I had thought it would be. I drove straight along the road to the southeast border of the National Park. I stopped briefly for a cup of coffee, and then took off again. I wanted to get to Olduvai Gorge before the sun came up.

As I drove, I thought about the questions I'd written in my notebook on the seat beside me. I had so many meaning-of-life questions. Why did the mother lion have to break her jaw? Why did the cubs have to suffer? Why did one of them have to starve to death? It happened. It was reality. I knew that as surely as I knew my fiancé had died, and, that, shortly after starting to work for Howard, my darling, crazy parents had died in a car accident. How could I make meaning out of real life so the audience wouldn't be haunted? I drove steadily, thankful that the road was relatively straight and that the moonlight showed the way. One hour from sunrise, I arrived. I turned off the Rover and sat perfectly still. Listening. Then, almost overwhelmed by a rush of feelings, I stepped out of the Land Rover with the crutch in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other. I leaned against the front of the Rover with the warm cup cradled in my hands.

Dawn crept into the sky like a promise. I set my empty cup on the hood of the Rover, and, using the crutch, walked to the edge of the gorge. Soon, a tiny piece of sun peeked over the eastern horizon. As it climbed, its rays crept down the far side of the gorge, lighting layer after layer. I knew that the brown, beige, and yellow-brown layers each had a story to tell of lives that had lived and died. The rays reached lower and lower into the gorge, lighting layers that told more and more ancient stories. I held my breath. The rays of the sun arrived at the bottom of the gorge, and the dim purple shadows in the valley were banished by light. The sun was shining on soil that told a story two million years old. I was filled with the vastness of time. The sun washed over me, warming me, and seemed to sweep through me with the life stories that it had warmed for millions of years. Something shivered through me. Ideas knit themselves together; the earth was full of life that went on and on and yet belonged to one story. I thought about the fossils found in the gorge. Death was a part of the process. The broken jaw of the lioness, the starving cubs--they, too, were part of that process. I saw Colin's face as he'd stood in the door of his house my first night on the Serengeti, the night I'd seen the lioness injured. And I heard his voice, barely above a whisper, "It is ordinary."

I felt tears spring to my eyes. Each individual was important and I knew it was right and good to preserve each life. But the cycle of life is the mother and her arms are ancient. The flesh of everything that dies returns to her arms. The cycle is real and the cycle is good.

I looked around me. I felt as if I'd been in a dream. I looked again at the bottom of the gorge. I knew that a vast, prehistoric lake had covered the ground. Layer by layer the lake had laid down silt, over millions and millions of years. Animal fossils had been found in the layers, many of them fossils of extinct species. Tools had been found, and the fossilized bones of the early humans who used them.

I'd found my answers. I'd found the arc to the documentary. I knew how to use the film we had, and I felt a certain peace enter my heart.

I returned to my Land Rover, knowing I needed to head back to Seronera to keep both Randi and me out of trouble. I poured a cup of coffee, and settled back with a sandwich. I thought again of the gorge. The archeologists had found fossils of giant pigs, sheep, and ostriches in the layers. They'd existed, lived, and now were extinct. I wondered how often, through the millions of years of time, animals had been injured or babies had died. There was no answer to the suffering and to the grief. But there was a sort of yielding to the arms of Mother Nature, accepting her for who she was and is.

I started the Land Rover and headed down the road to Seronera. I snacked on a couple of the cookies, stopped once to pour myself a cup of coffee from the thermos, and arrived, as promised, before lunch. I even had time for a shower. As I felt the water rinse over me, I finally knew that the film was ready to be completed. I would ask Perry take the crew to Olduvai to film as the sun came up. And I knew, now, how I was going to use the NASA film. "Howard's going to be pissed at me for sneaking away like that, but he's going to love me." I said this out loud.

I pulled on jeans and a tank top, retrieved the crutch from beside the door, and headed over to the dining room for lunch. I had already checked in with Randi when I'd returned. She and Howard were alone in the dining room. I was surprised to see Ribs on Howard's lap.

"Just the three of you," I said as I walked up to their table.

"Everyone else is in the field. The lions settled under our camera tree." Howard was happy. "They're filming as we speak."

We had lunch together. I told Howard I would be working on the script in my room in the afternoon and I'd show it to him at dinner.

I worked all afternoon, and at dinner I was able to hand him a draft. I was also able to walk over to the dining room without the crutch. We had only two more nights on the Serengeti. During one of them, the crew would be at Olduvai Gorge filming the sunrise. Hopefully there would be no clouds and no rain. In fact, when I told Perry what I wanted, he and the crew headed out in the middle of the night after a few hours sleep. They'd get the film in the morning.

After Howard read what I'd written, he and I talked until midnight, about narration, about editing, about what to change. I finally fell into bed. I hadn't seen Colin all day.

Our last day on the Serengeti, I went out with Colin. We found the Leo pride and watched them for a long time. It was a peaceful, quiet day. When we said goodbye in the late afternoon, I said, "I want you to come to LA to see the premiere."

He shook his head. "Too many cars. Too much work here."

What could I say? I couldn't stand the thought of leaving him. We hugged. He kissed me, the peck on the cheek kind of kiss, and before I started crying, I turned away from him. Then I stopped and turned back to him. "Are you sure you don't want to come to the party tonight in the dining room? Really, it's no big deal. A little music maybe. Just having fun and winding down."

"Nope," he said. "I'm going out to find the Acacia pride. Soon."

"Well, then. Maybe I'll see you in the morning. Thank you. I'll write. I..."

He took my cheeks in his hands, kissed me on the forehead, turned, went up the stairs to his porch and into the front door, and he shut the damn thing behind him. Fling. It had been fun, but it was definitely a fling.
Chapter 14

OK. So it was a fling and it was over. I tried to step lively as I walked up to my room, but it was an effort. A breeze was coming up. I could smell the grasses of the Serengeti.

Randi was already in the room, trying on a couple of the dresses she'd packed. I took my hair down, stepped in the shower, and washed my cares away. Not really. I did wash my hair, and bent over to rinse it thoroughly. I stepped out, dried off a bit, wrapped the towel around me, and she called to me, "Try this dress on for me before you get dressed. I want to see if I can get away without wearing a bra."

What? I peeked around the door, the towel wrapped around me.

She said, "For Patch. The Serengeti's been void of the physical thing for Patch and me, he with a roommate and me with a roommate. He's arranged for his roommate to sleep somewhere else tonight, and I'm spending the last night with him. I just want to...Well anyway..."

She held up a strapless, sea green sundress. It had a tight, stretchy lace bodice and a full skirt "It's got a bra to insert but I don't want to if I can get away with it. Turns me on a bit thinking about it. Just put it on, so I can see how it looks." She blushed.

"Why don't you try it on and I'll check it out."

"I want to see for myself," she said. "I want to see what Patch will see. I want sexy, but I don't want gross. Come on. Put it on and I'll braid your hair in back.

So I dropped the towel, slipped the dress over my head, and pulled it down over my breasts. Being larger than the petite Randi, my breasts filled the bodice out completely and swelled out at the top. I looked down. The lace was tight enough that I though she'd probably get away with it.

She came around in front of me. "I think maybe it's too much," she said.

"No it's not, and you're littler than me. They might hide better, you know, not push out so much." I couldn't believe we were having this conversation on an objective, pragmatic level. She went around behind me, pulled my hair back, and quickly twisted it into a single, thick braid.

The phone rang. Randi picked it up, listened a second, and handed it to me. "It's Colin."

I put the phone to my ear, said my hello, and he said, "I'm in the Rover. I'm heading out. Come with me. Run down here and come with me." I didn't say anything for a nanosecond, and he said, "I'll get you back in time to pack. I promise. I want to see you one more time."

The sound of his voice got me tingly. "Wait for me," I said. "Don't go. I'm on my way." I handed the phone to Randi without even saying goodbye, pulled on me hiking boots that had been sitting by the door, opened the door, and shouted, "See you later," as I ran down the veranda toward the steps.

I did hear a distant "Wait. My dress," coming from the room, but I was on my way to Colin and it was first grade all over again.

I ran down the path--clumped actually, my boots weren't tied--and reached the Land Rover in less than a minute. Colin had already opened the door for me, and I jumped in, no common sense, no rational thought, no social graces, just the last few hours that I'd get to spend with Colin on the Serengeti.

He did look me up and down briefly, but after I'd pulled the door shut, he backed up the Rover and we took off into the plains. As we drove along, he looked over at me, time and time again. He particularly seemed to enjoy the lace bodice. Oh, I was aware by this time that I hadn't dressed properly, that I'd rushed out without thinking, that I was wearing Randi's dress, that she had wanted to wear it tonight for Patch, and that I'd forgotten the fruit-of-the-looms. I didn't even have a jacket.

Colin found the Acacia pride about an hour later. He turned off the ignition. We got out and stood on the opposite side of the Land Rover so it was between the pride and us. Colin handed me some field glasses. "Cubs over there." He pointed.

I leaned my elbows on the hood of the car and found the cubs. They were sturdy, a bit bigger than Ribs. They were stalking each other, rolling around together, and attacking their mother's switching tail.

A sharp breeze came in like a juvenile delinquent and lifted my dress from the rear. I reached behind for it and tried to hold it down. I put the field glasses to my eyes again, and saw the cubs amble over to the big male. He was tolerant, swatted them around a bit, but he let them play. I got so engrossed in the cubs, I didn't feel the breeze lift my skirt a second time and I didn't feel it tuck the skirt around my waist. And there's me, bare bum to the whole Serengeti.

Colin noticed my situation, and here's how I knew. He came up behind me, wrapped his arms around my waist and slowly pulled me back against him. He kissed my neck, nuzzled my ear, and then he moved away briefly to take the field glasses from, set them through the window of the car, and when he stepped up to me again, and pulled me back against him, I realized he'd done more that get rid of the field glasses, because my bare bottom noticed immediately that It had been set free from its khaki cage.

Colin put his mouth to my ear and whispered, "Forgot your fruit-of-the-looms again," Yes, I'd told him the story when my feet were recovering from their adventure). He pulled me back against his hardness.

Colin played with the lacy bodice of my dress that, as you already know, was supposed to have a built in bra inserted into it and didn't, and was supposed to fit Randi, but was tight on me. He reached around and massaged my breasts. Then, with It still pressed hard against me bare bum, Colin began playing with my nipples through the lace.

He slid his hands down to my bare bottom and he paused for a moment, massaging, and then those warm hands moved over my hips to the front, and while his left hand held tightly to my hip, his right moved down between my legs and he slipped a finger inside me. And then, happy to be invited in, another finger entered. And there's me ready to be filled up. Colin slipped his fingers in and out, testing my readiness, and I was mad for him to enter me.

"I want you inside me," I whispered over my shoulder. I felt him harden even more, and who knew it was possible for anyone to, well...get that big. "Please," I whispered.

"I want you inside me" I said, and it wasn't a request this time. At precisely the same moment, he said, and it was a command, "I want to be inside you."

He pulled his fingers out and pushed my shoulders forward. I placed my hands on the hood of the car. I was totally bare back there, my dress up high. He lifted my hips toward him and knocked on the door, and I said come in and there was no slow and gentle this time. He thrust into me hard, fast, and all the way to the North Pole. I had never felt so filled up and so aroused. Two more hard thrusts and, thank-you, Randi for the dress, Vesuvius exploded.

A number of thrusts later, he moaned. I could tell he was trying to hold it together, to make it last longer, but I knew he was as turned on as I was. My inner, sassy-chick emerged and I reached my hands behind me and grabbed his buttocks on his next thrust and pulled him as hard as I could against me and he exploded inside me. Two or three thrusts and then suspended animation for a moment or two. Bliss, I'd call it. Then he pulled my hips back tight, reached one arm to pull me upright against him while he was still buried in me. He spread his legs apart slightly so I could lean back and down on him.

He crossed his arms over my chest, covering my lace-covered breasts with his hands. He took a deep, slow breath, and there we stayed, as still and as calm as could be. He was halfway hard and we were still connected. He'd claimed me and I'd claimed him and neither one of us wanted to let go.

I don't know how long we stayed like that. I mean, who wants to look at a watch? He nuzzled my neck, my shoulders, laid his head against my back and breathed softly against me. We watched the sun move down the sky toward sunset. And I was still filled up with him. We were connected to the Serengeti, to the wide, wide sky, to the sun slowly sinking, and to each other.

Inside of me, he was never completely still. I'd feel him swell, almost to complete hardness, and then he'd hold very still and soften a bit, and then he'd swell again, all slow, and quiet, and peaceful. I'd contract and rest, then contract, again.

And then twilight spread over us, and the sun disappeared entirely below the horizon. When he swelled this time, there was no softening. He was granite hard.

"Please," I whispered. "Now." He lowed the bodice of my dress below my breasts. Then he bent me forward so my hands were on the hood. He slowly pulled out until just his tip was knocking on the door. "Please," I said, and he pounded into me so hard he damn near sent me into the next county.

We made love through the rising of the moon. After a while, he paused, pull me up against him, and rubbed his fingers over my nipples. Then down I went again, hands on the hood, and the moon, by golly, was getting higher in the sky. I was sure lions were on the prowl, and we were outside of the Land Rover and I didn't care.

Finally, Colin began to moan, and his climax, accompanied by mine, seem to go on endlessly, judging by the rapid-fire thrusts, and the final Oh My God that escaped from him when he final slowed and slowed and stopped.

He calmed and we were still. And again he wanted to stay inside me. He spread his legs and pulled me tight against him. In the stillness after that I could hear the grass blowing in the night breeze. We were worn out, for sure, but it was--forgive me, but I've got to say it--pure poetry.

He hugged me to him, held my hips tightly against him, said he loved me, and heard me say it back to him. Then I, the rational one for a change, said "What about the lions?"

And he, the absent-minded for a change, said, "What about them?"

So, wanting to be more or less wise, we only stayed connected that way about ten more minutes or so. Maybe it was fifteen minutes. I don't know. It could have been thirty. All I know is the stars turned in the sky. And finally he said, "Yea, we gotta remember the lions.

"He slowly, gently pulled out, which took a long, delicious time and turned me on all over again, but I tried to be adult about it. He turned me around and wrapped me in his arms. He kissed me. Kissed me again. I whispered, "Lions." He sighed. Kissed me again. The skirt on my, or rather Randi's, dress was still plastered up against my back. My bottom was still bare to the whole of the ecosystem. Gentleman that he isn't, he began to massage my bottom again, and I felt him harden. "Are we doing this again?" I whispered.

He sighed. He lowered the dress into its proper and ladylike position. He kissed me, and massaged my bottom through the dress. Then he lifted the bodice over my breasts, cupped them, and leaned down and sucked my right nipple through the bodice, and again I whispered, "Are we doing this again?"

His mouth still covering my nipple, he said, "Yes, back in my bed in my cabin." He gave my nipple a proper little kiss, lifted his head, and kissed me sweetly. He stepped back, worked carefully to zip his pants over the impossibility of his hardness, walked around, opened my door for me, and helped me in. And that is the story of the day on the Serengeti when I forgot my fruit-of-the-looms and went outside in a dress with a full skirt on a breezy day.

Colin pulled his jacket from the back seat, handed it to me, and I wrapped it around my shoulders. He started the ignition, and we headed back to his place. I, vixen that I am, kept my hand in his lap the whole way.

We crawled into his bed, unbuttoned, unzipped, undressed, and he got on top of me, and we had a happy, missionary time. When we were finished, he stayed inside, a pleasant habit, and he got up on his elbows, looked into my eyes, and said, his voice husky with emotion, "Stay here with me."

I didn't move for a long time. His warmth and tenderness were overwhelming. I wanted to stay in his arms for the rest of my life. He leaned down, moved his lips softly over mine, whispered, "Don't leave." He kissed me, reached down with both hands to pull my hips tightly against him, and we rolled to our sides, still connected. I wanted him inside me forever. He brushed his fingers over my lips.

I closed my eyes and let him trace the features of my face. I felt sadness begin to move through me. I opened my eyes and looked into his. "I love you," I said. He claimed my lips and my mouth in a deep, demanding kiss. I felt him harden inside me. I pulled my lips away from his. I couldn't talk, didn't want to talk. I rested my hand on his cheek. He moved his mouth toward mine. I put my hand to his lips and held him away. I cleared my throat. "I have to go back. I can't stay."
Chapter 15

The following morning, I woke up in my own bed. I came back when our night moved from touches to words and our words turned to anger. I had a job to do. I had signed a contract. I had responsibilities. Colin understood, but he didn't want to.

And then I moved into a strange, defensive zone that involved righteous indignation. My work was as important as his. I don't do righteous indignation very well. I said things I didn't want to say. He did, too. We had to separate from each other, so we picked a damn fight to make it easier. And that was our good-bye.

I still had to pack and be ready for the bus when it left for Nairobi after breakfast. I was pulling on my robe when Randi returned from Patch's room. She was glowing.

"Nice time?"

"Nice time," she replied. "How about you?"

I nodded "I'm sorry about the dress. I'll pay you for it."

"Don't be silly. You can have it. I hope Colin liked it."

I nodded again, but then turned away and went into the bathroom for a shower. After getting dressed, I pulled out my suitcase and packed. I was miserable.

Randi wasn't quite ready to head over to breakfast, so I stepped out onto the veranda. The air was clean and smelled of the grasses. I leaned my elbows on the railing of the veranda. I wanted to run down to Colin's cabin, to say I was sorry, to tell him I would quit my job and stay with him forever. And I kept hoping I'd see him walking up the path to me to tell me it didn't matter, he'd keep in touch, and we'd be together again soon.

Then I heard a motor rumble. I stood up straight. My mouth went dry. I knew it was Colin's Land Rover. Sadness claimed me like a fever. I heard the Rover kick into gear. The motor got fainter and fainter as Colin drove into the Serengeti away from me.

He had been inside me for so long the night before that I felt like I still held him. Loneliness washed over me like a shroud. I didn't want to leave the Serengeti and I didn't want to leave him.

Randi peeked out the door. "I'm about ready. Want to head over to breakfast?"

"Sure."

"Just give me about five." She closed the door, and I leaned on the railing again, letting my eyes wander out to the distances. I thought about the last few days and what we'd accomplished. The crew had gone to _Olduvai Gorge_ to film the rising sun as its rays worked their way down the layers of ancient history. The park warden had called Colin to tell him that Ribs had been accepted by a program that would train him to hunt and survive in the wild. When he was ready, he'd be released into a new wildlife park in South Africa. The offer had come like a bolt out of the blue, and Colin was thrilled. The crew and I went with him when he took Ribs to the wildlife camp where he'd learn to survive. I'd watched Colin turn away from the camera when Perry zoomed in on his face. He brushed his hand through his hair, and I saw him quickly wipe his eyes.

I heard the door opening. I gave my head a little shake and took a deep breath. I knew it was time to leave the Serengeti. I gave one last, lonely look out to the vast expanse of grass. Randi said, "Let's go," and we headed over to breakfast.

The bus pulled in just as I finished my coffee. Randi and I retrieved our bags from the room, did a final check for misplaced items, checked out at the front desk, and climbed on the bus. And before I knew it, we were on the plane. I fell fast asleep and slept for a long time.

And then, I was home in my little Hollywood Hills apartment. I felt like I'd been in a time warp. I was unbalanced, almost lost.

I busied myself in my work. It was my only defense against loneliness. But the more I wrote about the Serengeti, the more disoriented I became. I looked at the old familiar sights of my neighborhood, and they seemed to have shifted, to have slipped off their foundations. Within a week of my arrival home, I knew I was the one who had changed. I'd fallen in love again and lost the person I loved. Just when I'd thought I was at peace with the loss of my fiance and my parents, I found myself diving deep into the agony of grief again because I'd lost Colin.

About two weeks after returning home, I gave myself a talking to. Colin may be half-a-world away, but he was still alive. We'd had a fight at the end, but that didn't mean that everything was absolutely over for us. Maybe it was, but maybe it wasn't. I was grieving, but I had to tell myself that Colin wasn't like my fiance or my parents whom I would never, ever see again. Colin wasn't in that category and I had to quit thinking like that. After all, there is such as thing as _Sorry._ I decided to go with that.

I pulled out some old-fashioned, writing paper, found an old fountain pen that had belonged to my father, filled it with ink, and painstakingly wrote an apology. It took me five tries. Try number one was still self-righteous about my rights as a working lady. Try number two was whiney. Try number three was needy. Try number four had no emotion in it whatsoever. With try number five, I was finally able to say what I wanted to say. I was sorry. It had been painful when he didn't want me to leave because I didn't want to leave either. I knew I had commitments I had to keep. I wanted him to understand that, and I got self-righteous when it seemed that he didn't. I hoped he understood my need to write, and although I might not be with Edwards Production Company forever, I at least wanted to see the current project through to the end. And finally, I said that I loved him and I missed him, and I hoped to see him in two months at the premiere. I folded the paper, slipped it in an envelope, sealed it, addressed it, took it to the post office, and sent it off to the Serengeti via airmail. It went with all my hopes.

I knew I had to focus on my work, so I decided I wouldn't think about getting a letter back or even an email for fourteen days. Meanwhile, I worked on the documentary. Perry and I edited film. I wrote and rewrote the narration. Howard, Perry, and I hired an actor we to read the script.

In the middle of all this, I helped Randi with her wedding. She was to be married a month before the documentary premiered. She already had her wedding dress, but we fussed around and had fun with all the other details.

After fourteen days, I began to listen for the click of my mail slot like a child listens for the patter or reindeer feet on Christmas Eve. I checked my email at least twenty times a day. Nothing. After another two weeks, I decided to email Colin to see if he got my letter. No reply. I checked his email address with Randi. I had it right. I emailed him a couple of times, in my business lady tone, to tell him know how the documentary was coming along. No reply.

Two weeks later, it was the night before Randi's wedding. I was excited for the wedding. I was devastated that I hadn't heard from Colin. He was fading from me like my fiance had. But my fiance was fading from an illness. Colin had no excuse at all. I knew he had been fond of Randi, especially as he got to know her when she took care of Ribs. Without thinking, I picked up my phone, dialed his number, and made myself stay on the line as it rang.

He didn't pick up, so I left a voice message telling him that tomorrow was Randi's wedding to Patch and that I wished he were here. I jabbered on a bit about the documentary, and then ended with an inane _I'd love to hear from you, just to chat, you know, nothing else._ I hung up, grimaced, and wished I could erase the message from my end. I couldn't. Yuck. Three weeks passed. No letters, no digital efforts to hit _Reply_ , no phone calls. What hurt the most was my ignored apology.

The documentary took up more and more of my time, and that was a blessing. It was to premiere at a small theater in Hollywood. It would be nothing like the huge premiere of a major movie, but I was looking forward to it. My work had been a solace, and I was ready to see the finished product.

I sent Colin an invitation to the premiere, but, as expected, I didn't get a response. I knew he was trying as hard to get over me as I was to get over him. Both of us knew it couldn't work with our careers. But, a friendly email would have been nice.

Howard had also sent an invitation to him, and told me he'd reserved a hotel room for him. Colin did reply to Howard, polite soul that he is, and said he wouldn't be able to come. Howard kept the hotel reservation for him, just in case.

About a week before the premiere, Randi and I decided to treat ourselves to new gowns for opening night. We wouldn't have the whole red-carpet thing, but I wanted to look good, and I wanted to feel feminine. No more moping around, no more depressing thoughts about how far away from Colin I was. I wanted to look sexy, and I wanted to feel sexy.

Randi found a dress right away, and she stuck with me when I rejected gown after gown. And then, there it was, a silky sea-blue gown, and I fell in love with. It was a simple shimmer of silk. It had tiny, tiny straps, a low neckline, a slit up the back to above the knees, and its own undergarment to ensure no panty lines, and no peek-a-boo down bosoms at the hors d'oeuvres table at the after-party. That undergarment was made of stretchy lace the same color as the dress. It was a one-piece teddy, thong in back so no panty lines, and the stretch of the teddy bodice was tight enough and strong enough to hold even my ladies so they wouldn't wibble-wobble. It held me in, and it held me steady, and its microscopic straps joined the ever-so-thin spaghetti straps of the dress. It was perfect, and exactly what I needed to keep me from retiring forever to my always-threatening, depressingly dank and cold, writer's garret.

The evening of the premiere, I took a long bath, dabbed some lavender oil behind my knees and between my breasts. I pulled on the teddy. I couldn't help looking at myself in the full-length mirror and thinking _All this stretchy lace and no Colin to enjoy it._ I took the gown off its hanger, and carefully slipped it over my hair which had been done up by a lady who knew what she was doing with tendrils and curls. The dress shimmered down over my hips to my ankles. I stepped into my heels, look again in the mirror, and grabbed the shawl that had come with the dress. I called a cab, grabbed my evening bag and headed out, sexy as hell and no one on the playground to play with me.

I'd seen Colin on the screen over and over during the editing process. I knew the documentary would bring him back to me for a while, but his presence would be brief, and when I walked out of the theater, he would be gone.

The taxi dropped me off at the front of the theater. Randi and Patch were already there, arms around each other. They'd been married for a month. Patch kissed me on the cheek. Randi gave me a hug. We all turned when Howard and Perry came out of the theater.

"Lovely ladies," said Howard.

Randi and I smiled and said thanks.

Perry had just started to say something when Patch interrupted. "Look!" He was pointing to the corner just across the street. "He's here!"

All of us turned to look. I saw a man in a tuxedo step off the curb and cross the street. My heart rose to my throat. My mouth went dry. It was Colin, and I was stunned. Everyone else hurried to the corner to greet him. I didn't move. I watched as they shook hands. Randi gave him a hug. Finally, he looked toward me and headed my way. I watched every single step he took toward me. Then he was standing right in front of me. Our eyes locked, and there was me, melting. He brushed his hand through his hair.

Everything moved in very, very slow motion. The group walked back to us, said they'd meet us after the show, turned and went in the theater (bless, their little hearts). Colin looked deeply into my eyes and then did his customary eye thing all the down my body and all the way back up again.

"Good evening, Lionbait," he said.

"What are you doing here?" Yep, that's all I could think of.

He took both my hands in his. "You look great." His eyes roamed again, and when he looked back into my eyes, he had real sensual thing going on. The white of his tuxedo shirt stood out clean and starched against his deeply golden tan. His shoulders, so broad in a t-shirt, looked even more muscular in the trim, well-fitted tuxedo coat.

"What are you doing here?" I'm in a loop now, trying hard to get out.

Colin grinned. "It's about my lions. I couldn't miss it." At that point he wrapped me in his arms and held me for a long time.

"I guess we better go in," my raspy-voice said. Colin turned to me, lifted the scarfy-shawl thing off my shoulders, draped it over his arm, and escorted me inside, his hand strong and firm on the small of my back. He draped my shawl over the back of my seat and we sat down. He moved his arm around my shoulder, not resting on the chair, but on me, and he accidentally-on-purpose let his hand fall casually down over my shoulder and dangle there, in tantalizing proximity to the swelling that was me.

I glanced up at him. I wanted to ask him what all of this meant, but I didn't know how. I whispered, "Did you get my letter?" but Colin put his finger on my lips as the theater went dark, and the music started. The tips of his fingers brushed imperceptibly against my skin.

The theater filled with the color of pure crimson red. Then came the image of the _Gloriosa_ lily, the blue and orange _Agama_ lizard, and finally the majestic male lion on the kopje. Over the shimmering image of the land rolled the words, _The Song of the Serengeti_. I felt my nerves tingle, as you can guess, for many reason. I looked up in Colin's face. His eyes were riveted to the screen.

The scene of the pride resting under the acacia tree, set to the music of Tchaikovsky, was a hit. Everyone laughed out loud at the indolent laziness of the lions accompanied by the booming canons of the _1812 Overture._ Colin moved his hand away from my shoulder, reached for my hand, laced his fingers with mine and settled his hand and my hand in my lap. His thumb rubbed gently along the back of my hand.

The lioness with the broken jaw came on the screen, and the cubs with my lack of objectivity as I ran to try to pick them up, and Colin when he stopped in the road to pick up Ribs. I was completely surprised, and Colin was, too, by the cheer that broke out when he picked up the cub. He let go of my hand, brushed his hand through his hair, and then put his arm over my shoulder again, rubbing his fingers up and down my shoulder.

The camera followed Rib's antics day to day, and the audience loved it. As the film continued, there were late night kills, and lions gorging themselves, and then the sun rose over the _Olduvai Gorge_. The narrator was saying, "...and it is ordinary. That's what makes it sacred." Didn't hear what came before because I was so full of the presence of Colin and so aware of the gently touches on my shoulder, but it didn't matter. I'd written it and I knew it, and it was about the cycle of life, and death is part of that, and the only way you can make sense of it is by yielding to the cycle, and you can fill in the rest.

Then the image of the lioness with the broken jaw and of her cubs came on the screen. Behind her, the earth appeared, and that's how I used the NASA film. The audience was hushed, almost reverent as the image of the lioness and her cubs faded from the screen and only the earth remained. Then the screen faded to black and the words _The End_ appeared.

For a long moment the theater was silent. Colin looked down at me, and smiled. I saw that his eyes were moist. The lights came up, and the place erupted in cheers, with a standing ovation a second later. Colin was on his feet as well. I stayed seated, tears running down my cheeks. Colin looked down at me, grabbed my hand, pulled me up beside him, and gave me a big ole fat kiss. He leaned back from me and said, "I didn't think anybody could get that across. You did it. Congratulations."

In the lobby, the hug-fest commenced. Howard kissed me on the cheek. Patch kissed me on the other cheek. Perry kissed me on the forehead. Randi pulled me into a long hug and said, "I'm so proud of you." She whispered in my ear, "And I'm so happy for you." Other friends came up, hugs all around, and finally all of us left for the after-party at the hotel. I didn't want to go to the party, but my grandmother would have scolded me for being impolite. Colin and I went and walked in the room hand-in-hand. We had wine, hors d'oeuvres, more wine, and, I have to admit, a good time. After a respectable time, Colin leaned down and whispered in my ear, "I have a room, just up stairs. Join me?"

I nodded. He took my hand, we got on the elevator alone, and he kissed me when the doors closed. On his floor the elevator door slid open, we walked out arm-in-arm, and he unlocked his door. Once in his room, he put his hands on my shoulders, and slipped down the straps of my gown. It slid to the floor with the grace for which silk is so famous. And there's Colin in his tuxedo. And there's me in my teddy.

He was hungry for me. Hands on bottom and massaging, and then he strips of his bow tie, and his jacket, and his tux shirt, and his tux pants, and he's got the neatest black boxers on, and they come off, and he pulls me on top of him on the bed, and he pulls the teddy below my breasts, and he latches on and works away with his hands on my bottom, playing with the teddy's thong strap. And then, I could tell he was getting impatient with the foreplay because he pulled the teddy down and off me, tossed it across the room, pulled me to him, and rolled so that he was on top of me. He paused a moment to ask, "Are you still on the _spill_?" I grinned and nodded my head yes, and I'm all slip and slide, and he slips in, and he doesn't politely say please may I come all the way in, he just rams himself to the center of the universe, my universe, and I was so turned on, I climaxed right there and then and again later when he climaxed. And, as was our tradition, we stayed connected. He lifted himself on his elbows so he wouldn't suffocate me, gentleman that he is, cupped his hands over the top of my head, and looked down into my eyes. And he really did have a rascally look on his face.

He lay down on me again, held my hips to him as he turned to his side, pulled me with him, pulling my top leg over his. His one hand slid under my bottom, holding it tightly to him..

Connected, and he was already halfway hard and getting a harder. Someone really ought to write a book about his abilities. Our eyes held on to each other for a long time. He pulled the tendrils off my face, ran his fingers over my lips, my eyebrows, my cheeks. I put my hands on his cheeks, leaned toward him, and kissed him lightly.

Then, I threw an illegal spitball and got thrown out of the game. Here's how it went.

He was still inside me, and we were looking into each other's eyes, and I asked, "Who's taking care of your lions?" It was an innocent question.

"I have an intern for six months."

"Great. Where's he from?"

"She's a PhD student at Oxford." _She?_ Not to worry. I'm not the jealous type. I have a very trusting personality.

"Oh," I said with no emphasis whatsever.

"She's working on a new methodology for recording and analyzing biological observation data. That's what her dissertation is about." _Blah Blah Blah_ "Oxford contacted me, I said OK, and I've been mentoring her. And who knows, if she comes up with valid results, it will have important consequences for wildlife."

Still inside me, still running his fingers over my lips, my eyes, still holding me tight against him down below.

"Well, that would nice," I said. "When did she start?"

"About a month after you left. We've had it formalized for about a year. _Formalized?_ _A year?_ At this point Colin started getting interested in my breasts again.

"What's her name?" It was the most pragmatic question in the world, a question asked all the time in all languages, everywhere.

"Candace."

_Candace? Candy? CANDY? C.A.N.D. bleeping Y?_ "Candy?" I asked, just wanted to verify what I'd heard.

He said, all innocence, "Actually it's Candace Harrington-Richelieu. Her father's French. They have an estate in England."

_Of course they have a bleeping estate in bleeping England and I'm sure she's got a bloody, sexy, English accent._ I was having trouble wrapping my mind around this whole thing despite my trusting personality. Is that why he hadn't written? Is that why he hadn't acknowledged my apology? All I said, however, was, "Candy?"

Colin shook his head and grinned. "Funny, huh? Cinnamon Sugar and Candy."

_Cinnamon Sugar and Candy_. _Fling one sweet and then fling the other?_ I didn't say this out loud. Give me some credit. And, really, I don't get jealous. I was just really scared.

I couldn't help myself, and I couldn't keep my mouth shut. "So, what are we talking here?" Oh, that sounded mean and nasty, but remember, I'm scared.

"What do you mean?"

The coincidence of her name after my name carried bad, bad, bad overtones for me. It suggested--oh, I don't know--sweet tarts. "What do you mean what do I mean?" (Grade school!)

Colin reached a hand to my cheek. "She's my intern. That's all."

"I'm not worried."

And then he made a mistake. He went back to his previous statement. He said, "Cinnamon Sugar and Candy. It's funny." He moved in to kiss me. And all this time, his hands are roaming.

I pulled back. I pulled his hands away from my breasts. I said, "It's not funny. Why didn't you write to me."

He kept trying. "OK, it's not funny. I'm sorry." Hands moving back to breasts. Moving in for a kiss.

Again I pulled away. "So what's up with Candy?"

"What do you mean, what's up?"

"I mean, do you go out together in your Land Rover, spend the night following the pride, make her peanut butter sandwiches?"

"Yes. Yes. And sometimes."

"You make her peanut butter sandwiches?"

"When it's late at night and the dining room is closed. Why?"

And here's where I put the spit on my spitball. "And then what?" It seems innocent, I know, but he knew what I was talking about.

He pulled out of me, pulled away from me, got up, pulled on a pair of jeans that were draped over an easy chair, buttoned them up, and there's me, naked in bed, and he said, "She's my intern. My student. I don't do that. I've never done that."

I was stunned. I'd never seen him so angry, so distant. He pulled on a t-shirt, sat on the bed, pulled on his shoes, and said, not looking at me at all, "I'll go downstairs and ask the desk to call you a taxi. I'll meet you in the lobby." He went to the door, opened it, looked back at me--here's the gun shot to the heart--and said, "Get dressed." He walked out and closed it behind him.

I mean, honestly, I was absolutely stunned, and I was angry with myself and my middle school manners. I'd like to think it was the name Candy that got me, but it was all me, all my fault. I'd been lonely, and I'd been scared, and I didn't want to lose him to an intern named Candy.

I got out of bed, pulled on the stupid teddy, pulled the dress over my head, stepped into my heels, picked up my evening bag and shawl, and I stood there. I looked at the closed door. This wasn't the way I wanted it to end. This really, really was not the way I wanted it end.

### Now Available

### Serengeti Serenade Unzipped

Book 2

Chapter 1

Here's the problem. I was on a plane to Nairobi, after which I'd be on a bus to Serengeti National Park, after which I'd settle into a room at the Seronera Lodge, after which I'd be expected at a meeting with Dr. Colin McCullough, world-renowned expert on the Serengeti lions. The inception of this problem was innocent enough. I conceived and wrote a documentary on Dr. McCullough and his lions, hung around with him for two months with a film crew, fell in love with the man, and we found out together the fun things bodies can do. I had to return to Los Angeles. He didn't want me to.

Not a word from him for three months. He came to Los Angeles for the premiere of the documentary. I got jealous (really, I'm not the jealous type) of an intern named Candace Harrington-Richelieu. Quite a mouthful until you compare it to my name. Thanks to my kooky, performance-art mother, my full name is Cinnamon Sugar Wyatt-Jones. It's a name that, if you pronounce the hyphen as a word, sounds eerily like a football cheer. Anyway, Cinnamon Sugar is bad enough (call me Cinn), but when you add an intern named Candy into the mix--I don't know--it made me think of sweet tarts.

After the premiere, Colin and I were in bed in his hotel room, and our hands were all over each other. I was doing the Hallelujah thing because maybe I wasn't going to lose him after all, and then I found out about Candy. I couldn't keep my mouth shut. He got angry. He kicked me out of his bed, told me to get dressed, got a taxi for me, and that was that.

So here's the crux of the problem. We--the film crew and I--were on our way back to the Serengeti to do an Oxford University/Global Warming Initiative-funded documentary on Candace's dissertation research. Centered on cutting-edge, digital data gathering, it had the potential to speed up collation of research findings of the effects of climate change on the biosphere. I know, _Blah Blah Blah_. But wait. Important stuff was going on in her work! Her methodology could help prevent loss of life. She'd focused her data gathering methods on the lions of the Serengeti. That's why Dr. McCullough was her advisor/mentor. He insisted that I be the writer on the documentary or he wouldn't do it. I mean where did that come from? I hadn't heard from him in the two months since the hotel fiasco. The documentary would be good for the lions of the Serengeti, good for future lives (humans included) that might be lost because of Global Warming, good for the University, good for the Global Warming Initiative, and good for the Edwards Production Company for whom I work. I. Could. Not. Say. No. That's my problem.

I did not want to see Colin again. I was out-of-this world angry with him. I was also out-of-this-world in love with him and had been devastated in that hotel room. I'd spent two months grieving. I could see no chance that he and I would ever get back together. I have my work. He has his work. I was trying to forget him. And yet, for three months I would have to eat, sleep, and breathe Dr. McCullough and his hazel eyes and all the rest of him, and, of course, his intern Candace.

Colin's a sexy, sexy man, and I could tell you about what happened during the two months we worked on the previous documentary. However, my story would lack the necessary social graces taught me (unsuccessfully) by my grandmother, she of the Victorian mindset.

We arrived at Seronera Lodge late at night. The cooks had sandwiches ready for us, and after a quick supper, I fell into bed and dropped off to sleep. When my alarm buzzed in the morning, I sleepwalked to the shower and washed away the miles and miles of travel.

I wrapped myself in my robe and poured a cup of coffee from the thermos I'd filled from the urn in the dining room the night before. I opened the door, stepped out on the veranda of the lodge, and looked out at the Serengeti. I took a deep breath of the air. The sun was just coming up. Its rays touched the tops of the Acacia trees and turned them golden. Long purple shadows stretched behind each tree. I heard a faint, full-throated roar in the distance. A Serengeti lion was greeting the sun. My anger melted. My fatigue faded. I was happy to be back. I'd never admit it to Dr. Colin McCullough, but somehow I felt at home.

I gave myself a little shake. I wanted to watch the acacia tree shadows shrink as the sun rose in the sky. I wanted to listen to the breeze in the grasses all morning long, but I had a meeting with Howard Edwards (owner of Edwards Production Company), Patch Whitney (soundman), Perry Kellogg (camera), and Dr. Colin McCullough. McCullough's cabin. Nine o'clock. Oh, and Candace, of course.

I pulled on a thong, a lacy bra, khaki pants, and a crisp, pink blouse. I slipped into my shoes and went to breakfast. (By the way, the thong and bra are a survival technique I used after my fiancé died almost four years earlier. My under-my-clothes girly garb kept the feminine part of me alive, just a little bit, and, in my grieving, kept me from retiring to a cold garret to write depressing novels about abandoned heroines and unrequited love. It reminded me of who I'd been with my fiancé. And now it reminded me of who I'd been with Colin, the second great love I'd lost in my life). I know I sound like the jealous type with the whole Candy thing, but there was a lot of grief going on inside me. I was beginning to think that grief was what I had been born for. Writing was my salvation as it had been my father's.

After breakfast, I took the time to do some unpacking. I picked up a small stack of shirts from my suitcase and carried them to the dresser. I noticed that the sun was shining through a small gap in the curtains, spotlighting the picture over my dresser. The picture frame barely contained the majesty of the rhinoceros that was pictured there. With its two horns and massive body, it looked invincible. I knew, however, that it wasn't invincible because poachers had brought the animal to the brink of extinction.

I put the shirts in the dresser and looked up at the picture again. The rhino's pointy lip told me the animal was a black rhinoceros. It used its prehensile lip like a finger to grasp and hold twigs to get at the leaves or to pull fruit from trees. My roommate for the next three months looked both wonderful and strange. Its legs were thick and stumpy. Its eyes were small, and its tail was short. Its gray skin stood out in the picture against the gold and green of the land around him. The way the sun peered into my room and shined on the rhinoceros captivated me. Somehow it made the animal seem exalted.

In my lodge room during the previous documentary, the picture over the dresser was of a pride of lions. It seemed fitting because they were the subjects of the film we were shooting. "And how about you?" I said out loud. "How are you going to fit into this documentary?" Yep, I was talking to my roomie, a two-dimensional rhinoceros.

I turned away and glanced at my watch. I was already a minute late for the meeting on Colin's porch. How could that have happened? Talking to a rhinoceros--that's how it happened. My grandmother's voice meandered its way into my brain. _Daydreaming, young lady, will cause you fail in your duties. Keep you mind on the task at hand and your hands minding the task given you._ She'd started trying to train me in her Victorian mindset before I'd even started kindergarten. How she survived having my mother for a daughter, I'll never know--a performance artist, for crying out loud! My detective father told me once that Nana's over-reaction to my mother's rather cutting-edge, crazy personality leaked over into her instructions to me. To tell the truth, I think it's a miracle that my mother fell in love with a detective. She saw the writer in him, I'm sure, and a hint of the Bohemian spirit that would fall madly in love with her. Oh God, how I missed them both! I glanced at my watch again. Five minutes late. Enough daydreaming down family-history lane. Time to go.

On my way to the door, I grabbed my coffee cup off the end table and took a last quick gulp of coffee--a too cold, too fast, and way-too-big gulp--and spilled it down my blouse. I looked at my watch. Six minutes late, and there's me with that old familiar hurry-up feeling that always trumped rational thought. My scientist, Dr. Colin McCullough, didn't appreciate latecomers. I ripped off the pink blouse, threw on a blue one, buttoned one, two buttons from the bottom up, phone rang, Howard said, 'Where the hell are you?" I said, "I'm on the way," and out the door I went, and down the path I ran, and up the stairs of Colin's porch where he waited to greet me.

He grinned. I hated him. His eyes lowered to my breasts, and I realized he was inappropriately enjoying the ladies. I glanced down. Top four buttons left unbuttoned in my haste, and there, for all to see, was my skimpy, lacy bra and the swell of the ladies saying Howdy-Do to Colin. This inability to travel through life with a Zen approach to dressing had been my constant companion. Colin knew it. During the filming of the last documentary, I'd told him my first grade story of the forgotten fruit-of-the-looms. And, there I was, unbuttoned, and the girls happy to be seen by the man who'd enjoyed them so much the last time I'd been in the Serengeti.

Dignity, C.S. Wyatt-Jones, I said to myself. I looked him directly in the eyes and started the process of buttoning up, but my hands were shaking. A very, very uneven job with the buttons.

Colin grinned--I hated him--took my hands, gave them a squeeze, lowered them to my sides, undid the two buttons I'd just misbuttoned--I despised him--and proceeded to button the buttons correctly--the bastard--all the while his eyes picnicking (or wanting to) on the playground of the ladies. The rascal. The pompous, self-important rascal.

"What took you so long?" called Howard from where he was sitting on the porch with Perry and Patch. _Thank you very much, Howard, for adding a layer to my embarrassment cake._

"Shut up, Howard," I said. Colin grinned at me again, took my arm like a gentleman, and, as we headed over to the group gathered in the rattan chairs, I whispered, "This is your fault."

"What's the matter with you," he whispered back.

"Shut up, Dr. McCullough." I did not whisper. After my second, impolite shut-up in less than thirty seconds, I took a self-awareness step back. I had known when I got off the plane that I was pissed off, but this was no puddle-after-a-rainfall pissed off. I was oceanically pissed off.

"Let's just get this meeting started," I said. I sat in the empty chair by the porch railing, crossed my legs, and pulled my notebook and pen out of my messenger bag. I was ready to be the professional writer that I knew I was. All business. Well, almost. "Where's Candace?" (Totally middle-school tone of voice).

Colin replied, "She'll be out in a minute. She's brewing up a pot of coffee."

In case you've forgotten, in the attack and counter-attack that had been going on smack in the center of the well-populated porch, Howard, Perry, and Patch were listening and not one of them had put on sound-canceling headphones.

Perry stood up and threw me a lifeline. "I'll help her." How obvious and sweet was that? I think they all knew what was going on. Howard, who had been like a father to me after my parents were killed in a car accident just after I'd started working for him, had listened to a full week of my granite-hard refusal to work on the second documentary. He knew me well enough to understand why I did NOT want to return to the Serengeti to film another documentary that involved Dr. Colin McCullough. I didn't tell anybody why Colin had flown back to the Serengeti the day after the premiere. But, most definitely, they all felt the tension between the two of us.

Just as Perry reached for the door handle, Candace emerged, carrying a coffee pot and a stack of mugs. "Coffee anyone?" she said cheerily. _Cheerily_!

Perry took the coffee pot from her. Patch stood up and took the mugs. The two of them served the coffee, and I'm one-hundred-percent positive that both of them were happy to have something physical to do. I'd bet my life on it. Howard, meanwhile, kept his fatherly eyes on me. I refused to look at him.

Colin took Candace's arm. "This is Candace Harrington-Richelieu." She smiled as Colin introduced us. We stood, shook hands, and said, "Nice to meet you." She said "Likewise," and we all sat down again.

I get ten points of extra credit for what I said next. "I'm excited about the impact your research could have." And I meant that. I love animals and humans and the earth and plants. I certainly didn't want to see them die off because of human foolishness and greed. And I wasn't going to deny the validity of her work just because her name was Candy and Colin was her advisor. The extra-credit would encourage the grown-up me to continue to be nice. Howard even gave me a fatherly pat on the arm.

Candace sat down next to Colin. "Thank you," she said. "I'm excited, too. Other scientists, besides Colin, are starting to use some of the results of my methodology."

Colin jumped in at this point, "In fact, a number of them are already participating in data gathering. Candace's goal is a world-wide database that will make correlation of facts more effective, so problems can be addressed more quickly."

"And when Colin told me about the last documentary," said Candace, "I couldn't help thinking that a documentary might be a good way to get the word out to other people, regular people. I'm not quite sure how to make data gathering interesting, but...well, Colin said you did a great job last time and would know how to do it."

I admit it, there's something wonderful about a person who cares about the earth. And she was professional as hell--my polar opposite in that regard. Nice khaki pants, white, crisp shirt hanging down over her hips, and a short, short haircut (brunette) that drew attention to her unbelievably beautiful face (I'll admit that, too) and her eyes (green). I know you probably expected shorty-short shorts and a skimpy tank top and that she would be all flirty with Colin in ladylike, subtle ways. But she wasn't, and when she talked, she was top-of-the-class intelligent. In normal life, minus the Colin factor, she was somebody I'd hang around with. After only about ten minutes on the porch, I admired her.

I, on the other hand, felt totally unbuttoned, and I'm not just talking about my shirt. I'm talking about my emotions, my reactions, my teenage tone of voice when I talked to Colin. I probably even had a booger on my cheek. _Unconscious check of cheek_.

I added milk and sugar to my coffee and hung on to the warm mug like a security blanket. I was so pissed at Colin, I couldn't think straight, but I had a job to do. A slow sip of coffee, a mental head slap directed at myself, and a deep breath helped me focus. I determined there and then to be as professional as Candace. At that point, I uncrossed my legs, re-crossed them to the other side, and my notebook slipped off my lap. I reached down to pick it up the same time that Howard did. My hand bumped his arm, and that little bit of jostling jiggled the coffee cup in my other hand, and a big, splat of coffee landed on my thigh.

"Sorry," said Howard. "My fault."

"No problem," I replied. Perry handed me a stack of napkins, and I patted at the spot. It didn't burn because the cream had cooled it, but I now had an uncomfortably damp thigh. I glanced at Colin. He was grinning. Professionalism is indeed an elusive beast. Damn.

Meanwhile, Candace continued to explain her dissertation project and her process of data collection, collation, and analysis to pinpoint the effects of chemicals in pollution upon the climate change that effected the life cycle of the lion.

I'm no dummy, either. Even with a damp thigh, I understood her. And, the more she talked, the more I admired her. Who, in this wide world of ours, wouldn't admire her passion for ecosystems and the earth and animals?

We talked. We drank coffee. We kicked around ideas. I said very little. In my schizophrenic state of mind--admiration for Candace and anger at Colin--I didn't dare. One more _shut-up_ out of me, and my grandmother would reach down from wherever her spirit resided and give me a sharp whack on the knuckles.

Colin handed out a tentative schedule for the week. We discussed my going out late that afternoon with him and Candace to begin to understand the process of her work. When the meeting was over, we stood up, smiled, muttered words, and shook hands.

I started down the stairs with Howard, Perry, Patch, and Candace, who, I'd found out, had a room at the lodge next to mine. Colin caught my arm. I turned to him. He waited a moment until everyone had started up the path. Then he said, "I think we should talk."

I got flash-bang angry. I loved the Serengeti, but I wanted to get the documentary finished and get home. My life had been defined by the people I'd lost. I'd lost my fiancé. I'd lost my parents. I'd lost Colin twice, and I hadn't even known him for a year. I grieved when I realized he was not going to keep in touch with me after I left the Serengeti for Los Angeles. And, when he surprised me at the premiere, like a risen-from-the-dead miracle, and then kicked me out of his bed in the hotel room, I grieved again. I wasn't done with that grieving, either. I was not happy. I did not want to talk to the man.

"No." Simple. To the point. A little louder than it needed to be. I went down the steps and started up the path.

"We need to talk," Colin said. His voice was louder and more insistent.

"No we don't," I said over my shoulder with a dismissive wave of the hand. I kept walking.

"Cinn, I need to explain." Much louder voice this time. I noticed Howard, halfway up the path. He turned briefly, glanced at me, then turned back, and kept walking. At that point, I turned around and stomped (the only word for it) back to Colin's cabin and up the stairs to his porch. I got right in his face.

"There's nothing to work out, Dr. McCullough. You never wrote to me. You never called me. And then you showed up at the premiere. I thought maybe...maybe...(Tears started here. Angry tears. I beat them back down)...And then you got out of bed. You told me to get dressed. You called me a taxi. I left. End of story." I turned to leave, took one step, and realized I wasn't finished. I turned back to him again. "And I'll tell you something else. Don't ever button my buttons for me ever again. EVER. I can button my own buttons."

"Not very well." He was trying for humor here, but I could tell he knew it hadn't worked.

"Shut up."

"Cinn..."

"I was in love. You said you loved me. I didn't hear anything from you for three months. Not a word. NOTHING." Loud, loud, loud voice. "And then you show up at the premiere and act all...you know..."

"I'm sorry. There's...I was..."

"Oh, and I'm sorry I acted like I was jealous."

"I'm sorry."

"Quit saying you're sorry. I felt like a...like a...Who do you think you are? Get dressed? GET DRESSED?" Tears welled in my eyes again as I remembered my humiliation. Colin reached to put his arms around me. I pulled away from him.

"Come in and let's talk."

I started down the steps. At the bottom I turned to him. He'd stuck his hands in his pockets. He looked lost. I so very much didn't care. "You shouldn't have demanded that I be the writer on this shoot. You put me in an unfair position. I'm not your...thing...you can order around. You put me in a position where I had no choice but to come here. It wasn't fair."

"I didn't want to lose you."

"Did you ever think of saying something like that in an email? You told me to get dressed. You put me in a taxi like I'm from some escort service. And not a word from you until I find out I have to come back here and work with you again."

"I'm sorry. I was scared. I didn't know how to..."

"Oh, shut up. Just shut up."

And that was that. He didn't say another word. I huffed and puffed up the path to my room. I'd blown that particular house down, and I intended to refrain utterly from building it again. Way, way too much pain in relationships. All they meant to me was loss.

### About the Author

Anne Knowles writes books and poetry for children, young adults and adults. A former VISTA Volunteer, zookeeper, and high school teacher, she currently spends her time writing, walking with her dog, and enjoying her grandson. She lives with her family in California.

You can connect with her at:

**Facebook:** http://www.facebook.com/anneknowlesauthor

**Blog** : http://anneknowles.blogspot.com/

Other Books by Anne Knowles

Serengeti Serenade Unzipped

Trouble Is...
