by Jadyn Chase
“You have to go back.”
She nodded. “I know. I just want you to know I’m grateful for everything you and your family have done for me. I wish there was some way I could repay that debt, but I know I can’t.”
“There is one thing you can do.”
“Name it,” she replied. “I’ll do anything you say.”
“Can we please go inside now? I can’t show my face in that house, either, until I bring you in. My Ma would have my backside if I came back without you.”
She broke into that smile that melted my insides. “All right. When you put it like that, I guess I can do it.”
I nodded down the Ridge and we set off together. We took our time about it, but neither of us said anything until we came to the trail again. I hesitated to go forward. I didn’t want this blissful moment to end. I wanted to keep walking through the woods holding her hand for the rest of my life.
She continued a few paces beyond me and turned back. “What’s wrong?”
I waved to her white shirt. “You’re bleeding. You must have torn your back when you fell over.”
“I’m all right,” she replied. “It doesn’t hurt now.”
“Get Ma to take a look at it when we get inside.”
“Okay.” She tried to walk away toward the house, but I didn’t move. I kept hold of her hand. She checked over her shoulder, and her eyes widened when she saw me standing there brooding. “Is anything wrong?”
I didn’t answer. No words could express what I felt at that moment. I pulled her back toward me and put my arms around her. Her eyes stared up at me out of two endless black pools. Her skin glowed in the dim light, and her impossible sweet lips enticed me down to my destruction.
She froze when I kissed her, but I no longer cared. She admitted to me that she liked me, and now she knew how I felt, too. If I had to lose her, I would at least steal this one kiss. I could dream about that in my old age when I remembered her.
The next minute, her lips melted against my mouth. She eased closer and her body vibrated with suppressed tension. Her breasts brushed my chest through her shirt. She wasn’t wearing a bra under her pajamas. Christ, she set my blood on fire with that kiss!
Her arms slipped around my neck and she drew me into her heavenly embrace. I never realized until that moment how much I needed this, but I didn’t need just any kiss, any woman rubbing her body against me. I needed her.
Maybe that’s what made me comfort her the way I did when I first met her. Maybe I knew even then that I needed this, that the aching hunger for her alone ate me up from the inside.
I could never let her go now. I would rather die. I blocked out everything else. The unalterable fact that she was leaving didn’t exist. It never happened. She alone became real. She became my whole reality.
I took her in my arms to pull her in. Without thinking about what I was doing, I dug my fingertips into her back. She flinched and yelped in pain, and the sound startled me out of the depths of ravenous desire.
I shot upright to see her wincing in agony. She writhed out of my arms still whimpering.
“I’m so sorry,” I growled. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to.”
“It’s all right.” She smacked her lips. “It just hurts. I should have remembered, but I forgot for a second.”
“Let me see it.” I turned her around and lifted up her shirt. A piece of her newly-scabbed back lay dripping blood and puss. “Oh, you’re bleeding again. Come on. Let’s get you inside.”
7
Nora
Caroline slid in my chair. “There you go, honey. How’s that?”
“Fine, thanks.”
I settled into my seat, and Caroline took her place at the far end of the dining table. The whole Kelly family lined both sides of the table.
Isaac bowed his head. “For this we are about to receive, may the Lord make us truly thankful.”
The whole family chorused, “Amen.”
Then arms and legs started flying in all directions. They laid into the platters of food covering the table. I probably wouldn’t have gotten anything to eat if Ezra hadn’t elbowed his relatives out of the way to serve me.
Pretty soon, everyone settled down to eat. I cast a wary glance down the table. All the guys from outside sat on either side of me, along with a few women I didn’t know. They packed the seats like sardines.
Liam sat directly across from me. When I made eye contact with anyone, especially him, I saw the horrible scene outside unfold before my eyes. They all knew what I did. I could never get it out of my head.
I bent my head over my plate. I had to mind my manners for the next twelve hours. Then I could leave this whole catastrophe behind me.
Just then, Liam leaned across the table. In a clear voice, he said very slowly and deliberately, “I’m sorry about what happened earlier, Nora. I didn’t mean to scare you like that. I should have been more careful.”
He locked his brilliant blue eyes on me to punctuate the words. I never expected that, and it took me back. I stammered out a hasty reply. “That’s all right. I’m sorry I hit you the way I did. I guess I just lost it for a second. I hope you can forgive me, too.”
He sat back in his chair with a big smile on his face. Isaac boomed from the head of the table. “I want to apologize to you, too, Nora, on behalf of our family. It was an unfortunate mistake, and I hope you can put it aside. Thank you for joining us for dinner tonight. I wasn’t sure you would be able to face us after what happened outside. We all understand you’re traumatized after your encounter with the Lynches, and I want to assure you we’re nothing like them.”
I pushed my mashed potatoes back and forth on my plate. I heard my own voice coming from far away. “You’ll have to forgive me if it takes me a little longer to accept that.”
The minute I said the words, I regretted them. What was I doing, throwing their kindness and consideration back in their faces? Isaac didn’t miss a beat. “You have no reason to accept it. You don’t know anything about us. You have no reason to believe we’ll be any different from the Lynches. I only regret you won’t stay long enough to find out for yourself. We could never do what the Lynches did to you and your friends. We would never attack defenseless people and terrorize them the way they did.”
I nodded down at my fork, too numb to think straight. “I understand that. I even believe it. I just can’t guarantee you I won’t react again the way I did today. I wish I could behave as if I believed it because I know you’re good people—all of you. You’ve been so good to me since I first came. I don’t know how I can ever repay you. I just don’t know if I won’t lose control again. I see you…. like that, and I can’t stop myself. I can only think about fighting.”
“It’s all right,” Ezra murmured in my ear. “We all understand. Believe me, any one of us would react the same way if we came face to face with the Lynches.”
I looked up at him. He towered over me with his big, protective presence. “Really?”
“Sure.” He snorted. “The Lynches scare the pants off me.”
Everyone at the table burst out laughing, and they attacked their food again. The tension dispersed. The air of jovial familiarity enveloped the room, but I couldn’t stop staring up at Ezra.
He was afraid of the Lynches? Him? He was a big, strong mountain man who could smash me to crumbs between his thumb and forefinger. He was also a dragon, and he was afraid of the Lynches?
I cast a quick eye over the table before coming back to look at him. No one at the table gave his comments a passing thought, so they must all feel the same way. They were all afraid of the Lynches. Who in their right mind wouldn’t be?
Maybe I wasn’t as messed up as I thought I was. I saw my ordeal in a new light. What did I have to be ashamed of? I faced down those fearsome dragons and lived to tell the tale. Everyone at this table understood exactly what I went through. They knew how scary it was. They knew facing a dragon—any dragon—would throw me back into a state of fighting for
my life because they’d all been there themselves.
Ezra remained sitting there at my side. He didn’t eat. He observed the thoughts running through my head without saying anything. He was always, always there, always steady, always considerate, always understanding.
How could I leave this? How could I leave him? Who else on the planet would understand what I went through? I could never go back to my normal life. I couldn’t face the questions from the State Troopers and my family and my friends and my professors and everyone else.
If I ever loved a man, I would have to explain how I got those scars. How could I let anyone see my back? No one would believe me. If I tried to tell, I could get locked up in a psych ward or worse.
My eyes drifted around the table. For the first time, I saw these people, this Clan, as normal. The rest of the world was insane, and now I was one of them. If I went back to my old life, I would have to put on a veneer of insanity and I could never take it down, not even with the people I loved and trusted most in the world.
A door opened between two possible roads into my future. I could choose to become one of the walking insane. I could hide the truth and pretend none of this ever happened. I could deceive everyone, including myself, or I could remain in this tiny pocket of sanity. I could stay with the only people alive who really, truly understood me—the only people who would ever understand me.
Ezra told me my scars were a badge of honor on Smokey Ridge. He and his Clan were the only people who would ever see them that way. They would be the only people who would think I was a hero for breaking out of that compound. The rest of the world would consider me delusional beyond redemption.
Caroline rose from her chair and stacked two empty dishes one on top of the other. She leaned close to me. “Are you gonna eat that, honey?”
Liam guffawed across the table. “You better eat up before she vacuums up all the rest of the food.”
I shoveled as much food into my stomach as I could fit. I couldn’t eat much after all the excitement of the day. When I put down my fork, Ezra tried to take my plate. “No,” I told him. “I want to help out.”
I carried trays and platters to the kitchen and helped Carline do the dishes. “You should go to bed, honey,” she told me. “You’re still not completely healed.”
“I feel fine,” I replied. “I want to burn off some energy. I’ve been in bed too long.”
From the kitchen, I spotted Ezra, his father, his uncle, and a pack of his brothers talking in the living room. What were they talking about? My insides burned when I remembered the Lynches. They still prowled the area. Were Ezra and his relatives planning to go after them?
He noticed me watching. Not long after, the conversation broke up. Men drifted off in different directions. A few people settled down in the living room to read or talk or just hang out.
After Caroline and I loaded the dishwasher and cleaned the rest of the kitchen, I found myself at loose ends. I didn’t really belong down here with the family. I had nowhere else to go but back to my room. I would be alone up there, and I didn’t want that. I’d been alone for days, and after my realization at the dinner table, I wanted to be near these people, if only for a few hours more before I left them behind forever.
Caroline brushed past me on her way to the stairs. I hovered there for a moment, uncertain what to do with myself, when Ezra entered the house. He walked past me to the stairs, paused on the bottom step to cast a meaningful glance at me over his shoulder, and then ascended to the second floor.
A torturous lick of excitement forked through my guts. Did I read that look right? Was he telling me what I thought he was telling me? The kiss we shared in the woods came back to me. What if…..what if I could share just one night with him? What if we could give each other the connection and care we both craved, just once?
I had nothing to lose by finding out. My heart pattered climbing the stairs. My bedroom occupied the first door on the right. I hesitated outside in the hallway. Farther along the darkened corridor, a burly form hovered in the shadows outside another room. It was him.
What if he wasn’t thinking the same thing? What if I misread him and made a fool of myself? What if I ruined all the goodwill between us by presuming he wanted it when he didn’t?
I lingered in the hall for what seemed like an eternity before he came toward me. His feet made no sound on the carpet. He stopped in front of me. His loose hair draped around his smoldering visage and made him look feral and mysterious. At the same time, it made him look softer, more vulnerable, more tender. My hands ached to touch that face.
His hulking frame blocked out my whole awareness. My heart raced. What was about to happen? Could this be the turning point of my entire life?
He bent down and kissed me with that strange mixture of sweetness and earthy must I tasted on his lips outside. He cradled my head in one mighty hand, and my insides dissolved in matchless desire. I wanted him. I wanted all of him right now.
He straightened up, but I couldn’t see his eyes in the dark. For a single instant, I wished he was a dragon so I could see his eyes burning down at me from high above. That image didn’t scare me. It was only him, the real him inside this form of a man.
Then he took my hand and pulled me back to his own room. Moonlight flooded through the window. In here, I could see his face more clearly. His eyes burned out of a countenance locked in intense determination.
He closed the door behind me. The latch clicked. That sound echoed down the years to rewrite my whole world. I wanted him. I wanted so much more than one night, but that could never be.
He towed me into his kiss, and my flesh went all squishy with warmth and heat. A gnawing ache devoured me between my legs. I thirsted to drink him into myself and make myself whole. He was the part of me I was missing all these years and never knew it.
In the midst of kissing him, his powerful hand came to rest on the back of my neck. Oh, he owned me with that hand. He moved my head sideways, and his mouth consumed me to the bottom of my soul. I submitted to the ultimate mastery of his touch. He had me, and I never wanted him to let me go.
His other hand settled first on my shoulder. That didn’t present any great challenge, but my whole being trembled at the possibilities. Before I could prepare myself, he dragged it down to my chest and cupped one plump breast in his magnificent grasp.
I whined into his mouth, but he didn’t release me. The swirling stroke of his fingers and palm over my nipple exposed under my shirt sent me into spasms of ecstasy. I gyrated in his hands, but he kept a commanding hold on me at every second.
His fingertips dallied down my stomach, and I quivered all over from the sheer intensity of it all. I stared in blank amazement at the shadowy figure holding me still. This was a dragon. This was Ezra—my Ezra, the man I admired from afar these last few days.
He found the waistband of my pajama pants, but he didn’t go inside. He tickled farther down my belly to the twitching cleft between my legs. My juices gushed out to meet him. Oh, if only I could get him to touch me there, to ease the craven need in me for him and only him.
His fingers slotted between my legs and he rubbed me softly through my pants. He clamped his other hand around the back of my neck so I could never escape. He fingered me to rapturous sighs on a torrent of blissful delight.
All at once, he turned us both around and backed up to his bed. He sat down on the edge and drew me between his knees. He lifted my shirt over my head, and my bare breasts rested in front of his face.
His mouth closed around my nipple, and I almost collapsed in utter euphoria. I didn’t even care when he slid my pants down to my ankles.
He steered to straddle his lap, but he always made sure never to touch my back or any of the raw scarred skin on my legs or hips. He took great care never to go near any skin that might hurt me, but the attention he paid to my front drove me wild.
I devoured his kisses in a whirlwind of fevered excitement. My soul kept whimpering again and again, Ezra, Ezra
, Ezra.
He peeled his t-shirt off. The moonlight cast every rippling muscle and cleft in stark relief. His body took my breath away. I had to touch him, to feel him against me. In answer to my thoughts, his fingers found the back of my neck one more time. He pulled me in, but he didn’t put his arms around me. He let me do it all by myself.
My breasts and belly sobbed in blessed relief to find his chest and his midsection and his shoulders. Powerful waves of heat and desire licked down me to the dark nest between my legs. I needed him so bad, I couldn’t stand it.
I pumped my hips against the hardness inside his pants. I wanted his hands on me. He guided my waist in both hands and slid up to massage my breasts. He lifted them one after another into his mouth, and I nearly fainted from intoxicated bliss.
He reared back, and his glinting eyes caught the light. He glared straight down into the bottom of my soul. With a quick movement, he got off the bed and yanked his jeans down.
My whole being screamed, Yes! I needed him. I wanted him. Whatever tomorrow might bring, I needed to take tonight with me. I would never forgive myself if I didn’t give in to this.
When Ezra sat back down on the bed, I came to rest on his lap with nothing protecting me from his throbbing manhood. Without thinking about it, I sank onto the distended shaft, and my juicy opening welcomed him into the secret recesses of my anatomy.
A deep growl vibrated out of his chest. I recognized that sound. It was the dragon growling. The noise sent a lightning bolt of adrenaline through my insides, and I stiffened every nerve.
The next instant, his thickness started moving inside me. It stroked parts of me I never knew existed. It electrified the forgotten corners of my being until showers of sparkling pleasure rippled through me from head to toe.
He growled again, and that sound transformed in my mind. It became something thrilling, something that bonded me to him as I could bond with no one else. I was his. I belonged to the dragon. When I looked into his eyes and heard that sound, I became his.
