by Vonna Harper
"Trust." The word came from low in her throat. "If you wanted, you could kill me."
He wasn't sure he, or anyone else, could choke off life with just one hand, but he had no doubt of her point. Cautiously, he kneaded the area below her jaw-line. "Have you thought I might try that? I've thrown a lot at you, forced you to question things about John that—"
"I don't want to talk about him."
"I don't think that's possible."
For a second or two she didn't move. Then she pushed away, but before he could decide what his response should be, she leaned back into him. "You're right." She sighed. "He's always going to be between us, isn't he?"
"Maybe not right now."
"I need that."
Had he whispered sweet nothings with other women? Maybe, not that he could remember a word of what he'd spoken to the women who'd come before her…or their names or what they looked and felt like.
What did it mean to have no existence beyond this moment or the woman in his arms? The thought frightened him, but if there was a way out of the emotion, he didn't try to find it.
"I didn't know this was going to happen," he admitted. "Between us, I mean."
"Neither did I, but when I first saw you…"
"What?" He not-so-casually placed his hand on her inner thigh. "What did you think when I walked into the barn?"
"I told you."
Maybe so but he wanted to hear it again. "I'm sorry if I startled you."
"I wasn't. At least not after the first few seconds. I've…I've been alone for a long time."
She sounded so young and vulnerable that it nearly tore him apart. Any other time, with any other woman, he might have been tempted to take advantage of it, but this was her.
"I'm sorry," he whispered. "But you aren't alone now." He gently squeezed what he could reach of her thigh through the heavy fabric.
"Unless he finds us."
"You don't want to talk about John." He spoke more sharply than he'd intended. "I don't want to talk about whoever is trying to kill us."
She sighed and ran her hand over his chest. Like her, he hadn't taken time to button his shirt, making it easy for her to slide her fingers inside the cloth. He felt the warm, soft contact in his groin. "Ignorance?" she asked. "Is that what we're after?"
"No," he whispered. Had he ever felt more naked? "At least I'm not. What I need is proof that you're all right."
"You know I am." Her fingers marched slowly south, teasing the area below his ribs and causing him to suck in his breath. If it was cold, he was no longer aware of it.
"No," he admitted. "I don't know that. Those bullets didn't find you, but there's more than just the physical."
"Is there?" she asked and he swore she was holding back laughter. "Oh, I understand what you're talking about." Fastening her fingers over his jeans' button, she deftly freed it. "The whole emotional thing. But I don't want to go there, not now. I need—you know what I need."
A blind, deaf, and dumb man could figure that out. He also suspected the emotion wouldn't last long, and she'd need more than carnal affirmation that they'd survived, but he'd be a fool if he didn't take advantage of the situation. If he didn't let her take advantage of him.
Standing, he unceremoniously dropped his jeans. His briefs came next, leaving him with his garments bunched around his hastily slipped into boots. While he balanced himself by resting his hand on the top of her head, she pulled off first one boot and then the other. He stepped free.
Now it was her turn to stand. Before he could reach out to help her disrobe, she shucked off her clothes. He'd made sure they were sheltered by trees, and yet the moon found her. She became something other than a flesh and blood woman; her skin took on a silvery cast, making her all of one flowing piece, angles and curves, mystery and promise. His cock swelled even more. If he touched her cunt, would she be wet?
He touched. She was.
Dimly he wondered if he was going too fast, assuming too much too soon, but facing death had left him needing, not just sex, but her. When she spread her legs and thrust her hips at him, increasing his access to her, he knew she felt the same way. Stepping into the shelter of her legs, he bent slightly so he could work his fingers into her. She sobbed low and hard deep in her throat and grabbed his shoulders, holding on with everything in her.
No slow buildup here; no lingering and languid seduction. This was going to be sex, tough, primitive sex. He came at her, one hand still in and on and over her pussy, the other grinding into her belly until she was forced to take a backward step. Her nails dug into his shoulders; he wondered if she was drawing blood. Still, he came at her, making her retreat until she came in contact with a tree behind her. He didn't like the thought of rough bark digging into her ass, but she gave no indication she was in discomfort. Instead, she released his shoulders, flattened her palms over his breasts, and captured his nipples between thumb and forefinger.
She pinched. He felt, not pain, but hot electricity from chest to cock.
"Fuck me, Devin!"
"Just like that?"
"Now, please!"
Now, please. This wasn't the practical woman experienced in wilderness trips, even a lonely widow. If she'd become a bitch in heat, what did that make him?
A stud.
Laughing at the image of himself as a stud or stallion, he nevertheless didn't fight or deny the possibilities.
"Not on the ground," he told her. "It's too hard."
"And bugs."
"I see you've been thinking about this."
"So have you." She pinched again. "Don't try to deny it."
"Ow! No, I won't." Instead of trying to free himself, he moved his pussy-buried fingers in a slow, searching circle.
She rewarded him with a throaty sob; her hot fluids drenched his fingers, ran into his palm, oozed toward his wrist. Her cunt muscles tightened around him, then spasmed. The thought of her heated strength swallowing his cock took him beyond amusement and exploration, centered him on the undeniable need for release. When this was over, he'd spend the day, the night, hell, a week pleasuring her. But not now.
"How do you want it?" He slid his hand from her belly around to her ass so he could arch her toward him. She needed little encouragement and willingly bent her knees, making her more defenseless, more open to assault.
"I don't know," she whispered. "I've had so little experience."
And she trusted him to guide her toward what she needed. Understanding that changed him in a way he didn't quite grasp and yet knew he'd never forget. She didn't want to hear about his sexual history, and he didn't want that becoming part of tonight.
"I want this to be for you," he told her. "For me, too, but mostly you."
She shook her head. Although her features were only a blur, he swore he could see into her hungry eyes, understood the emotion in her soft and vulnerable mouth. Because he wanted her to be able to think, he stopped teasing her cunt.
"For both of us, please." Her breath floated over his chin and neck.
"Don't worry. I'll get what I need. Do you trust me?"
Her response took too long and told him too much, and yet he didn't want it any other way.
"At this moment I do," she said.
Chapter 12
He turned her away from him, guiding her by first placing his hands on her hips. The fingers that had so recently been inside her were wet with her fluids, and he wiped them off on her left flank. She looked down and back at what he was doing but said nothing. He wanted to take her now, hard, fuck her as she'd begged him, but even with his blood heating him, she deserved more.
And if truth be known, so did he.
Once her back was to him, he slid his arm around her waist and drew her to him. Her curves fit into his angles; the small of her back made the perfect home for his swollen cock. Still holding her against him, he slowly, lightly ran his other hand over her arm and around to her breasts. Not hurrying what was an only half-formed idea of how they'd accomplish this fuck, h
e concentrated on the outer swelling. She arched back into him, silently welcoming and begging for more. She groped behind her with both hands until she found his hip bones and clung to them. Her exposed and defenseless body said everything. I'm yours, all of me. Whatever you want to do, here I am.
Inching closer and closer to her nipple, he tried to enter her mind, feel what she felt, want what she wanted. The experience, although not entirely new to him, had never been this all-consuming. She deserved to be told that he found her breasts desirable. He did, the truth coming out through his fingers, his nails, the heel of his hand.
By turn he imagined that his hand was a feather; then it became a butterfly, even briefly, a fiery brand. Every time he reinvented himself, she reacted by gasping and sagging a little, pressing more firmly against him.
Her head fell back against his shoulder. He leaned his cheek against hers and breathed in the forest scent that had become part of her. Although she could reach very little of him, he appreciated the effort, occasionally thinking of nothing except the touch, the taste even of her nails trailing up and down and over his hips. He wanted her to take his cock in her hands and cradle it, speak to it in the language of the flesh. Soon, yes, soon, he'd surrender to sex.
But not yet. First he lifted and cradled her breasts, drove the heel of his hand into her lower belly, spun little spider webs with his nails at the joining of leg and pelvis. The gentle scratching caused her to growl in a way he'd never heard before.
She was opening herself to him, inch by inch increasing the space between her legs, gifting him with even more proof of how much, at this moment at least, she trusted him. His head pulsed; he gave up trying to focus. He took told of her pubic hair and worked his fingers into it, tugging lightly, reaching even further around her so he could flick her swollen labial lips; he operated on automatic pilot.
Yes, her body kept telling him. Yes, this is what I need. Play me; strum me as if I was a guitar. But he heard her only on a primitive, primal level because that's what he was becoming. His cock felt huge and hot and needy, and he begun thrusting it at her. He barely existed beyond his sex organ.
Unexpectedly, she leaned away from him. Air unheated by either of them chased down his chest, reached his belly, attacked his cock. He shuddered and tried to pull her back into him. She resisted.
He shook his head and tried to clear his mind, his body even. Only then did he realize she hadn't stepped away as he'd thought, but was readying herself for sex, for him. Bending low at the waist, she placed her hands on her knees for support and spread her legs as far as they would go.
She looked over her shoulder at him, and although night kept many of her secrets, he sensed her embarrassment and courage.
Loving her, at least for this moment, he put his hands on her butt cheeks and spread them so he could slide his cock into her offered pussy. She continued to stare up at him, maybe unaware that he couldn't read her expression. She trembled, breathing quick and shallow.
It's all right, he wanted to tell her. You'll always be safe with me, and this is good. But just the thought of those words made him feel as if he was bleeding, losing his independence, his protective layers. He could give her his body and take hers; he just couldn't talk about what they were doing.
He slid into her, slowly working his cock in, each of them shifting position to make the connection as tight and sure as possible. While adjusting himself to her and helping her absorb him, he'd lost his hold on a little of his arousal, but the moment they were sealed together and he'd laced his arms around her hips so she wouldn't lose her balance, he started pumping. His heart pounded. He felt her heat and moisture along the length of his shaft, and every time his balls slapped her flesh, a shock jolted him.
She moved with him, her thrusts timed so that each time he pushed his cock as deep in her as possible, her ass was rising up to meet him and suck him even further. And when he drew back, she did the same so his cock felt and tested every millimeter of her cunt.
He could have raced toward a climax; she would have let him. But he didn't. Instead, he went deep inside himself and found a slower rhythm. He lived, breathed even inside her, educated himself about her inner recesses, explored her fully. He learned anew that she was physically strong and limber, that she didn't care that her breasts swung freely and her hair had come unbraided and tumbled down around her face.
She'd all but forgotten how to breathe, and sexual excitement made her noisy. Her pussy wasn't just wet; it had flooded. He had to be careful not to slide out of her.
He didn't. His pelvis muscles took over, picking up the pace, straining, straining, feeling as if he was climbing a mountain with the sun beating down around him and a voice screaming for him to hurry—maybe his own voice. He could do this forever. He wanted this moment to last and last and last. And yet the mountain peak was so close, and he might explode or die if he didn't reach it.
Closer, closer he came to the edge. He swore he was running naked and exposed. He loved the way he felt, as if was expanding and expanding and a thousand tongues were licking his cock.
Clamping his hands against her pelvis, he forced her to slow so he could concentrate, so he could prepare, be, do.
Do!
Release!
Release and release and release until there was nothing left of him.
Ana heard Devin's hard, short grunts, but she was too far gone to acknowledge them. This is you, she told herself. No longer a woman but a wanton. A true wanton!
Her cheeks flamed; she wondered if she was catching fire. Then her pussy started to spasm, and she forgot everything else. She was going to scream, scream! Explode.
Let it happen! Be that wanton.
At the last moment before sanity and climax, she managed to clench her teeth. The spasms gripped her. She felt as if she was being torn apart.
* * * * *
She was no longer hunched forward like a dog about to be mounted. He must have helped her straighten and turned her toward him because she couldn't remember doing it herself.
"I'm sorry. I lost you," he said.
Devin sounded as if he was in a tunnel. Without opening her eyes or lifting her head from his shoulder, Ana struggled to make sense of what he'd said; it took a great deal of effort.
"You didn't lose me. I'm here," she said. Her body felt as if she'd been floating in a heated whirlpool and was so languid and spent that she couldn't identify its separate parts. "And I was with you."
"Then you climaxed?"
"Several times. So close together I'm not sure how many." That she could say this and feel no embarrassment served as further proof of how far he'd taken her from the creature she'd always been.
"I didn't mean for it to be that way." He stroked her back. "You asked me for something; I wanted to give it to you. But then…I think I needed to celebrate being alive as much as you did."
He was getting at something profound, and much as she enjoyed the floating sensation, she couldn't stay there forever. She vaguely remembered him holding her up as his penis deflated and slid out of her. Her breathing had still been returning to normal when he pulled a tightly compressed waterproof ground cover out of his backpack and spread it on the ground. Not saying anything, they'd dressed and lain down under his blanket. After unsuccessfully trying to use his cell phone, he'd pulled her against him. She thought she'd fallen asleep but maybe she'd only been caught in the afterglow of sex.
It was still hard to think of anything except their bodies' joining; with everything in her, she wanted to stay in that nothing place. But if she didn't face something now, it would only surface during the night.
"What are you thinking about?" he asked. "You're getting tense."
She wasn't aware of having moved and certainly didn't want to alter the way she'd spooned herself against him. The sweat had dried on their bodies, lending a slightly gritty quality to the flesh-to-flesh contact. She liked the earthy, real feel.
"I won't press," he continued. "If you'd rather n
ot talk about it—"
"You're right," she interrupted. "I'd rather not. But it won't go away. I was almost asleep when it came back at me, almost like those bullets that nearly killed us."
It was his turn to say nothing which made her wonder if he sensed where this was going.
"You said. . ." She swallowed. "You believe you have proof of John's involvement in Aaron's murder. What is it?"
He'd stopped stroking her back, but now he started again. "I told you; I've kept the messages Aaron left on the cell phone I used last year."
She nearly asked how it was in his possession instead of part of the law enforcement investigation, but he was a cop, kind of, and could have every right to it. Besides, that question might distract her from the most important thing.
"It's with you?" she whispered although she already knew the answer.
"Yes."
"The battery is charged? I can listen?" Her temples throbbed.
"Yes."
He hadn't wanted to say that; she heard the reluctance in his voice. "Now?" she pushed.
"You're sure?"
"I need to do this before I talk myself out of it. Please, don't make this any harder than it already is."
Silent, he slipped away from her and sat up. Silent, he reached for his backpack and pulled it toward him. He opened it and held up a cell phone.
"I always keep it with me," he said.
She was trembling again; this time her reaction had nothing to do with being cold or sexually excited.
He showed her how to access the message function, turned up the volume, and placed it next to her ear, holding it in place. She kept her eyes closed.
"Dev? Dev, where the hell are you?" a strong male voice asked. "I sure hope you're all right, man. Next life we're going to get safe jobs like rodeo bull riders. I've made contact. It's taken about what we figured it would, hanging out at a good old boys' bar and shooting off my mouth. I bought a couple of rounds pretending I saw myself as hot shit because I'd figured out a way not to have to fork over for an out-of-state hunting license. Then I asked how many game cops are in the area. I'm not there yet. No one's come out and said they'd help me poach, but they sure checked out that bad-ass urban assault vehicle I'm driving. Nothing like advertising you've got more money than smarts. Anyway, I'm supposed to meet with someone tomorrow who's supposed to know something. It's all very hush-hush, at least as quiet as a drunk can be."
