Drawing Deep

by Jennifer Dellerman

  “There you are,” Melinda swept into the dining room with a bright smile that reflected in her sparkling hazel eyes. A warm, welcoming expression that made Ria once again uneasy. She got that hospitality was Melinda’s business and people paying to stay at the bed-and-breakfast expected such a reception, but Ria wasn’t exactly here for pleasure.

  She wondered if that smile would falter if she told the other woman her secret, or blurted out that she knew exactly what her husband and sons really were.

  No. She just couldn’t do it. She found she rather liked being the recipient of that smile. “Here I am. Breakfast was wonderful. Thank you.”

  Melinda pulled out a chair across from Ria and sat down in a graceful flow. “Our pleasure.” She nodded at Ria’s empty plate. “There’s plenty more if you want seconds.”

  “No. I’m good. Thanks.” Ria brushed her hands over her khaki-colored bush pants. “Besides, I should probably get going. Lance said something about towing duty?”

  “Hmm. Yes. We were able to gather many of the items requested and have them loaded in a small trailer. Have you ever driven a quad runner before?”

  Ria blinked. Ah. That’s what Lance meant. “I have actually. We use them in places a larger vehicle can’t go. They’re great for hauling.” Or hurriedly pulling several buried items free from their underwater grave to the side of a forested river bed before a rival group of treasure seekers could hunt them down.

  Melinda nodded and looked Ria over. “Good. Do you have a jacket and a hat. It will warm up later, but it’s still a bit chilly out and I wouldn’t want you to catch a cold.”

  The motherly concern nudged the edge of Ria’s heart. “In my bag.” She glanced down at the floor by her chair where she’d set her backpack before taking a seat.

  “All right, then.” Melinda stood and reached for Ria’s empty plate, waving off her objection. “The maintenance shed is behind the crop shop where Porter’s hooking everything up. We’ll go through the kitchen as it’s faster, and then I’ll show you the way.”

  Hearing the sound of footsteps from the foyer and the unmistakeable chatter of children as other guests grew close to the dining room, Ria snatched up her pack – and one of the wrapped muffins – and hastened after Melinda through the butler pantry. “Oh. You don’t have to do that. I remember where the shop is.” It wasn’t like the big, tan metal building was hard to miss.

  Pushing through the still-moving swinging doors that separated the kitchen from the dining area, Ria jerked to a stop, eyes goggling at the sight of Rome wielding a rather sharp looking knife at the counter. He sent her a quick nod over his shoulder, not ceasing in his task of cutting carrots. Annie was working some dough not far from him.

  “You know Rome and Annie.” Melinda said, crossing behind a young blonde woman at the kitchen sink washing a large pot. Ria’s hostess placed the dirty plate and utensils in the dishwasher, not bothering to rinse them first as Ria had pretty much licked it clean.

  “Yes. Good morning.”

  “This is Sarah. She is, for lack of a better term, one of our maids slash prep cooks. She assists Annie in whatever needs to be done to keep the b&b running smoothly and our guests happy.”

  Sarah turned her head to give Ria a shy smile. “Hi.”

  “Hello.”

  “Ria is one of our special guests.” At Melinda’s words, Ria’s brows puckered. What did that mean?

  Luckily Annie spoke before the blunt question could make it to her lips. “Did you enjoy breakfast?”

  Ria’s features smoothed out. “Yes. Very much. Thank you.”

  The elderly woman set the dough into a large metal bowl and covered it with a towel. “I hear your men left you alone to do the grunt work. I must say, I don’t approve.”

  “Annie.” Melinda scolded.

  “Actually, I got the better end of the deal.” Ria grinned at the show of offense on her behalf. “I’ll only be towing the equipment on a quad, not breaking my back while I lug it out on foot.”

  Annie’s face split and she let out a snicker. “Serves them right. Rome, get that thermos, will you?”

  Without a word, Rome reached for a cylinder container on the counter and handed it, along with a small cooler, to Ria. The objection died in her throat when he said in a low voice, “It’s best not to question or argue. Trust me on this.”

  “I remembered you’re not big on coffee, so that’s filled with my spiced chai tea latte.” Annie told her.

  Ria lifted bright eyes to the woman who was quickly becoming her most favorite person in the world. “Like what you gave me last time?”

  “Of course. Now that thermos is not to be shared, you hear me? That’s all yours. Same as the cooler. The others have their own.”

  “Thank you so much.” Ria’s lips curved in a wide, natural smile. This was beyond hospitality.

  Annie marched over to the sink. “Welcome. Mind you this won’t be an everyday occurrence so don’t be thinking you’ll have a packed lunch each morning. Starting tomorrow, if you want lunch, you’ll need to make it yourself. Same as the others in your group. I might be the cook, but I’m not their mother.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Ria replied solemnly, her mouth already watering for a taste of the tea. She’d not found the same anywhere else, and she’d searched everywhere. Nothing had compared to her memory.

  The same problem she feared she had when it came to Santos.

  Tucking the thermos in the outside netted pocket of her backpack, Ria said her goodbyes and fled the homey kitchen. She’d worn a long-sleeved shirt over a t-shirt, and that over a tank top, knowing layers were key when it came to working in the field. The temperature had risen enough she didn’t require a jacket.

  Following a pretty flagstone pathway, she crossed behind the impressive garden and stepped off onto dirt. Trees flanked both sides of the crop shop, providing shade and a sudden chill. She walked quickly along one side of the metal building towards the rear entrance. It was the cursing that reached her ears first as she turned the corner and located the entrance provided by a set of open metal doors.

  “Stupid piece of shit. What’s wrong with you? You were working an hour ago.”

  She might have smiled at the clearly frustrated male tone if her belly didn’t suddenly quiver with excitement. Her nipples, already tight due to the cold, budded into even tighter points. The physical reaction made her pause in confusion, until she reached the threshold.

  It wasn’t Porter her eyes lighted on, but Santos. More specifically, his backside. Even though all the Felix males had dark hair and similar strong physique, Ria knew in that second she would be able to pick Santos out blindfolded. It was in the way her body responded to his presence, the increase of her heartbeat, the unsteady flow of air entering her lungs.

  It took a second for her to realize he hadn’t heard or scented her, an oddity in a shifter. Then again, maybe the herb cigarettes were working. Or it could be that the strange, sharp thumping noise intermixed with loud voices that carried through the far wall, the one shared with the processing center, or the crop shop, held his attention.

  “The dial needs to read 4500,” Santos straightened and yelled at the wall, confirming her thoughts.

  Taking advantage of the opportunity, Ria ogled the man in front of her. His head was down, face tilted as he focused on the happenings in the other room. Strong thighs, encased in jeans so worn they cupped his very delectable ass, were spread slightly for balance. Corded muscles rippled along his arm as he twirled a wrench in his right hand, his left on his hip. His dark hair was pulled back in a thick tail at the base of his neck and ended two inches lower, bisecting his back and drawing her eye to the way the dark t-shirt stretched over masculine shoulders.

  The palms of her hands began to tingle. She wanted to run them through those thick strands, along those wide shoulders and down over the sleek muscles that encased a potent male form.

  Bet he had a six-pack. She plucked at the neckline of her shirt, feeling over
ly heated in the most unsuitable places, and swallowed the buildup of saliva in her mouth.

  There was no denying what she could see of the outside package was weakening her knees, but outside packages fade. It’s what the inside contains that mattered most. Her own paternal side of the family boasted of good-looking men, who were filled with nothing but cold arrogance and nasty pus.

  Knowing this, Ria still couldn’t seem to stop mentally mauling the eye-candy in front of her, feeling things low in her body start to tighten, yet melt at the same time.

  And this from just looking at his backside. What would happen when he turned around?

  The thought made her shiver.

  Santos nodded when the sharp thumping noise began to even out into a low bumping sound, and he opened his mouth to berate the hapless quad once again.

  “Bastard. It’s your turn now you...” Pivoting on his booted heels, he stopped in mid-sentence as he came face-to-face with Ria, who was silently watching him from a mere ten feet away. She might have greeted him, if she hadn’t suddenly come down with a case of muteness at the sight of those deep brown eyes that ensnared her, reeling her in like a fish on a hook. She could feel the muscles in her legs begin to quiver with the need to move closer.

  A lovely flush of color darkened his cheeks. “Uh, sorry.”

  His words broke her stupefaction and she gave him a tight smile. “It’s nothing I haven’t heard before. Or said myself for that matter.” Uncomfortable under his steady gaze, she shifted her weight and nodded at the machine with the engine cover lifted. “Problem I take it?”

  Santos finally took his eyes from her to frown at the quad, frustration once again lacing his words. “Nothing that a sledgehammer won’t fix.”

  While Ria had felt the same sentiment with her laptop on a few occasions, Santos didn’t sound like he was joking. “That’s a bit severe.”

  “Not on the quad. On Porter.”

  Ria took a step back. Santos didn’t need any weapon to cause physical harm. He was a weapon. He was also angry, and she didn’t want to get caught up in a shifter’s anger.

  Santos raised a brow at her cautious move, his head cocking slightly as he perused her nervous stance. “Relax. I’m only kidding. Mostly.”

  The verbal reassurance did nothing to ease her jangling nerves. Her eyes flitted to the heavy wrench he held in his hands, her brain immediately reverting back to childhood stories about shifters and their brutal and unforgiving temperaments.

  Following her gaze to the tool gripped in his hand, Santos pursed his lips. Then he slowly headed to a long worktable that lined the far side wall, putting the entire room between them. “The engine’s still warm so I knew that’s the quad Porter used when he mucked out the stalls this morning.” His tone was low and meant to be soothing, his movements deliberately careful as he replaced the tool and tidied up the bench. “One of our rules is to report a problem immediately so it can either be resolved without delay, or at the very least, known about so it can be tackled when time permits.”

  It was telling, the cautious way Santos handled her reaction. It was also a little mortifying as she’d skilled herself in controlling any outward signs of fear or anxiety. Not to mention he probably thought Ria either timid as a mouse or the victim of assault or abuse. The fact that he was right didn’t make her feel better. He hadn’t threatened her.

  Her great-grandfather had threatened her often, and followed up on those threats. Though her father was subservient to Kalin, it was Ria who took the brunt of Kalin’s dictatorship and displeasure. Whether it be a test subject for the latest and most painful spell Kalin had concocted, a whipping post when something went wrong, or whored out to her sister’s husband to be used as a broodmare. It didn’t matter. If Ria hadn’t acted that fateful night without delay...

  Chapter Five

  “Delays can cost.” Though her words were a bare murmur, Santos caught them none-the-less.

  Turning so his back leaned against the worktable, he settled his forearms on top of the bench, crossed his booted feet and nodded. “Exactly.” Though his posture was all nonchalance, his dark eyes were both gentle and probing, as if he were coaxing a wounded creature out of hiding to be tended to. She had the strangest feeling that if she walked up to him, he wouldn’t hesitate to draw her into a tight and protective embrace.

  Odd for one whom she’d been told killed the weak.

  And for one who was told to fear shifters like the plague, Ria found she wouldn’t mind having those arms wrap around her, snuggling her to that powerful chest. She also wouldn’t mind seeing what that chest looked like bare, and there was no denying she wanted to run her hands over all the planes and angles his shirt hinted at.

  But that wasn’t what she was here for and if she didn’t get out to the site, God knew what kind of mess Chris would create with his heavy-handed approach to the delicate task ahead. If he had his way, they would have arrived with power washers and blasted all the dirt from stone walls, destroying any evidence as to the origin of the ruin.

  Stepping smoothly into the maintenance room, she walked to the second quad hitched to a tarp-covered trailer. “Thanks for gathering up all the supplies.”

  “Welcome.”

  Pasting on a smile, she turned to him. “I’m sure you have many other things to do, so I’ll just be on my way.”

  “Actually,” he straightened and picked up a keyring from the table, “We’ll be on our way.”

  “Oh. There’s no need. I know how to drive one of these.”

  “I’m sure you do.” With each step that brought him closer, Ria felt her heart sped up. Only this time it wasn’t in some childhood fear. His hips moved with a lithe grace that drew an appreciative eye. Wide shoulders rolled with each step, turning his muscled frame into an animated work of art. Living, breathing and very male work of art. Her belly reacted to all that prime, grade A beef with an embarrassing quiver that made her squeeze her thighs together.

  Swallowing the extra spit that formed in her mouth, Ria asked, “But?”

  He stopped on the other side of the trailer and she caught his scent for the first time, a combination of clean male and musk. It made her blood heat. “The gate to the reserve is now secured with a thumb scan lock. I need to go with you to give you access. Same as Gwen did for the rest of your group earlier.”

  Her eyes went wide. She knew they’d had some problems with thieves and trespassers – yeah okay and some men with guns chasing down Gwen and Rome – but a thumbprint scanner?

  When she said that aloud, Santos jerked up his chin. “We protect what’s ours and we don’t mess around.”

  So noted. “Guess not.”

  He reached for the cooler in her hand and tucked it securely under the tarp before straddling the quad. “You have a jacket?” When she didn’t respond right away, he looked up from slotting in the key. “You might get cold.”

  At the moment she would relish a little cool air. “I’ve got several layers on. I’m good.”

  His eyes raked slowly down her body, from head to feet, pausing at her breast and hips, leaving nothing out. Ria usually ignored such a blatant perusal. She was a woman after all and men had a tendency to check out her sleek form and generous curves. But she couldn’t ignore the smoldering interest that filled Santos’s eyes when he made contact with her own once again. Not when her body mimicked that sexual interest and tossed it back at him with brazen need. “Hop on then.”

  The husky invitation made her toes curl, inciting a wicked desire to take him up on the double entendre and climb on board. From the front. Facing him, with her legs wrapped around his waist. As the erotic image formed, an overload of pressure snaked through her body to collect at the hot, aching place between her thighs. As if aware of her naughty thoughts, and approving whole-hardheartedly, Santos watched her through dark eyes now glittering with sparks of electric green at the edges.

  That was what brought her back from the abyss. She couldn’t forget what he was. What she
was. Not yet, anyway. While she no longer believed, at least deep down, that this family of shifters would harm her physically should – when – her vampirism was brought to light, she had no wish to see disgust fill the face before her at sleeping with the enemy, so to speak.

  Vividly conscience of his heightened senses and the liquid heat that had pooled to dampen her panties, she quickly settled herself behind him on the padded seat before she could change her mind. There was no bar at her back to hold on to so she curled her hands into fists, her spine stiff as a poker, trying to distance her body from his as much as possible. But there was nothing she could do about their legs. Her inner thighs naturally pressed along his muscled ones when she set her boots on the foot rests.

  The engine came to life with a loud roar and they set off at a crawl until they made it through the doorway and over the bump created by the higher concrete floor of the maintenance room. He didn’t pause to shut the doors, the reason clear as they passed Andreas walking toward them.

  “Morning.” The Felix patriarch nodded at Ria.

  “Good morning, and thank you for the loan of your tools.”

  Andreas’s eyes flashed briefly to the trailer before returning to Ria. “No problem. I’d prefer nothing be left out overnight.”

  Ria understood what he didn’t say and could appreciate his stance. “We’ll bring everything back when we finish for the day.”

  Another nod. “Just leave the quad and trailer outside the kitchen and we’ll take care of it.”

  “I’ll be back within the hour,” Santos told his father. “Tell Porter that if he wants a quad for the morning, he’d better fix the one he broke.”

  This induced a raised brow from Andreas. “Will do.”

  “Thanks, Dad.”