To boot, they belonged to a breathtaking, masculine face, a face one would expect to see on the cover of a magazine named something like, I’m Way Too Hot To Be Your Man, or In Your Dreams, Honey.
Oh, yeah. Without a doubt, I’d topped myself this time. Sculpted cheekbones, thick dark lashes, chiseled jaw, and lips so full they simply had to be meant for kissing or eating something really juicy. He was way hotter than the specimen of perfection from my last dream, and bonus, he didn’t have that scary vibe. I reached up and ran my fingertip along the ridge of his hard-lined warrior nose.
“Emma, what in the name of the gods’ creation are you doing?” he scorned. “We really don’t have time for your immature little fantasies. We’re in the middle of a crisis. Do you not remember?”
I blinked and slowly moved my eyes from side to side.
Jungle? I was in the jungle. And my clothes were wet. Come to think of it, for a dream, I didn’t feel so hot. My lungs burned, my body felt like it’d been chewed up, and my head was throbbing. So, aside from the perfect man with long, damp, wavy black hair holding me in his arms, none of this felt like a dream. It felt…
“Holy Mother!” I pushed myself away and rolled into the dirt, pointing in disbelief. “Wha—you—you—?”
“Ah...so eloquent as always, my sweet. It is astounding; you actually have a college degree, yet cannot find better words.” He pushed himself up off the ground.
As he rose, my heart stopped, started, then went into overdrive. His legs and spine straightened into a towering mass of unforgiving muscles. With shoulders like a lumberjack and thick, powerful thighs, I didn’t know if I wanted to run away or climb him like a tree. He was utterly enormous. Jolly Green Giant enormous. Except, obviously, not green. More golden brown. He was a gorgeous, towering mass of golden brown perfection.
No. Definitely not a cave-dwelling, wart-infested troll. Great. Just great. Now I knew I wasn’t crazy—Guy was definitely real—but now I also knew I was way over my head. He was gorgeous.
I stood in awe, my mouth gaping as my eyes attempted to register every rope of muscle, every capacious curve packed with power. Christ, he had to be at least seven feet tall.
“Six nine, actually,” he said, guessing my thoughts.
“This can’t be possible,” I whispered, my eyes continuing to dart up and down the length of his body, stopping right on dark trail of hair that started just below his navel and continued down, down, down to his enormous beast of a—“Oh! You’re naked.” I turned sharply, but only to stop myself from reaching out to touch it. No man could be that…that…endowed. Wow. “This can’t be happening.” I covered my face.
“Emma,” he moved behind me, placing his powerful hands on my shoulders. A jolt shivered its way through my body.
I was wrong about the vibe. Way wrong. This man, or whatever he was, radiated hazard. He should come equipped with a set of blinking lights or flares. He was…“Bad. Very, very, bad,” I mumbled, pinching the bridge of my nose.
And pathetically, after everything that had happened, all I could think about was this naked, hard-bodied, glorious “man” who’d just permanently seared his image inside the storage compartments of my female DNA. All men, from this day forward, would have to survive a mental side-by-side comparison against him. They’d all lose.
Then a part of my brain, which was now marinating in a pool of whatever hormonal overload he’d triggered, was trying to tell me something important. It wasn’t ready to capitulate and hand over the keys to the Emma-kingdom.
Ah... there it is. “Don’t touch me!” I swiveled sharply, pushing his hands from my body, pointing one angry finger in his face. “I asked you for one simple thing! One!”
The corners of his delicious lips curled as he arrogantly flipped his dark, wet hair over his bronzed shoulder. “Exactly. You asked.” He took one bold step forward, well within my personal-space bubble. Clearly, he was trying to intimidate me with his endless ripples and naked body. How sad. It was totally working, which made me even madder.
He bent down to meet my glare, his nose inches from mine. “But I didn’t agree. Did I? In fact, my exact words were, ‘I. Will. Not. Promise.’ Sharp emphasis given on the not, little girl.”
He so had this coming. I lifted my knee, thrusting squarely in his groin. The almost-seven-foot brawny male fell to his knees cupping himself.
“I am not a little girl. Emphasis on the not. And you lied to me! You’re eyes are turquoise.” With the darkening sky, I couldn’t see the exact color, but I saw they were in that ballpark. They were also beacons of heaven I wanted to lose myself in. The bastard.
Then I had an extremely poignant moment of lucidity. What was I thinking? This man, only he wasn’t a man, could snap me like a twig with his pinkies. He looked like a walking, talking, killing machine, designed to tear me limb to limb…
Right after he makes hot, steamy love—bad hormones. Stop that, I scolded myself.
I hated him. He was the embodiment of male pig. And best not forget that someone out there thought he was dangerous enough to imprison him in an ancient Mayan pool, and I had just freed him. Sure, he’d said they were “bad”, but that could have been a lie.
Understanding what an idiot I was, I did the only thing I could think of.
I ran.
***
The darkness had swallowed the jungle whole, leaving me scrambling over vine-covered branches, rocks, and anything else my bare feet could stub a toe on. I really missed my shoes. Damned kitty. I wasn’t going to get far, but what other option was there? Guy was…he was…there were no words for him. But now I knew why he wanted me to see him first. Bastard likely thought he could switch from using his guilt trips and voice on me to simply flexing his biceps or swinging his gargantuan penis in my face.
Why the hell had I set him free in the first place? Oh, yeah. Because he said he might be able to find out what happened to my grandmother, and he was slowly driving me insane. And, I’ll admit, a tiny part of me wanted to know who or what he really was. Was he a demon? The ghost of gladiator past? I still had no clue.
For certain, he was more beautiful than any living creature should be, which was sufficiently dangerous on its own. Making matters infinitely more perilous, something about him overrode every rational thought in my mind while igniting every female impulse my body was capable of. He was concentrated with an abundance of raw male power, and his body turned me into a dim-witted moth, hell-bent on getting warm and cozy in that nice bright flame.
I don’t know how I found the power to pull away from him, from the need to wrap my legs around his waist, but I was glad I had. He wasn’t good for me when he was just an alluring voice in my head, and he wasn’t good for me now.
I stumbled my way through the darkness, praying to God I was heading in the direction of a road or the lake. I reached out to clear away the next wall of terrifying, critter infested vegetation, hoping I wouldn’t haphazardly grope a snake, or worse, that enormous kitty, but instead found a washboard stomach.
“Emma. That wasn’t very nice.”
“Crap.” I turned to run the other way, but he latched on to my shoulders and pulled me against his unnaturally hard body. A crippling vibration moved through me, paralyzing every inch of my body while simultaneously sending my lust into overdrive.
This was just not right. I wanted him to kiss me. Maybe more than kiss me. “Are you going to kill me?” If he didn’t, I was about to stop breathing, anyway…way too much man. Way too naked.
He let out a low, sinister chuckle—the one I knew all too well—and then released me. “Kill? What’s gotten into you? Although,” he released me and rubbed his groin while I stared wantonly at his thick, long shaft. “If you pull that stunt again, I might be forced to incapacitate you, and trust me, it’ll hurt.”
I tried to gauge his seriousness, even though it was too dark to see his expression clearly. But really, did I need to see more to know he meant business? For heaven’s sake, his touc
h was like a stun gun. Okay. Time for different tactic.
“Please,” I whimpered. “Just let me go. You promised.”
“My sweet, let’s get one thing straight. You’re not going anywhere until I’ve figured out why those people want you. Got it?”
His scent filled my lungs and pummeled my self-control. He smelled like rich, dark chocolate, with a hint of smoky spice.
I nodded my head yes, looking down at my feet. I was so confused. So damned confused.
“Come.” He grabbed my trembling hand.
“Where are you taking me?” I stumbled behind him as he yanked me along.
“To see Señora Rosa and her husband.”
“What are you going to do to them?” I said.
“Ask them questions, what else?” he said casually.
“Ow!” I fell forward grasping my badly stubbed toe.
Guy swiftly slung me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.
“Put me down,” I hissed. “You’re hurting me.” The vibrations of his touch flowed through me once again, turning my body to mush and my nipples as hard as rocks. Did he have any clue what he was doing to me? Or how much I hated him for it?
“You’ve got no shoes, Emma, and I somehow doubt those city-girl feet of yours are accustomed to the jungle floor. It’s also pitch black and there are poisonous creatures lurking,” he said, gliding in between the trees, effortlessly ducking and weaving through the vines.
I wanted to snap something back, but what could I say? It figured he could see in the dark. All monsters could.
“I don’t know what you are, but…I…still…hate…you.”
He made a soft, low chuckle. “You don’t hate me, that’s impossible. Besides, I already saw your eyes, Emma, and I can feel the lust flowing through your body this very moment. You most definitely want me. It’s almost too painful for me to stand.”
There was nothing to say to that.
Chapter FOURTEEN
After walking twenty minutes—well, he walked while I tried not to pass out from his touch or from being carried upside down—we arrived back to the Maya Sol Eco-resort. Guy gingerly sat me down on a small bench next to a large tree. “Stay there. If you try to get up—”
“What?” I gasped for air as he kneeled in front of me. “You’ll kill me?”
He frowned, then swept the damp hair from my face. “No, my sweet, you’ll fall over and hurt yourself. It takes a few minutes for the effect to wear off.”
“Why does your touch do that?” I stared at the mammoth sized man as he rose slowly. The light of the nearby cabins gave off a subtle glow, just enough to see the soft shadows of his perfect body. My eyes moved down his powerful lines, stopping right on his large…“Oh, God.” I slammed my eyes shut. “Would you please put some clothes on and stop waving that thing in my face?”
“Right. Let’s pretend you won’t be begging for another peek later.”
He was right. I wanted another look already. “Pig,” I called out as he turned and stalked off into the night.
Guy reappeared several minutes later wearing some kind of a sarong, which he must have snagged from someone’s laundry line. It might have looked silly on any other man, but he looked like a Greek god or some kind of ancient savage warrior. His hair had been tied back, and even in the dark, I could make out the powerful slope of muscles that ran down his neck and faded into the curve of his broad shoulders.
Yum. I hit my forehead in disgust. I so needed to get this Guy out of my head. He had to be letting off some kind of debilitating, pheromone based drug. Man-crack. Yes. Trashy, highly addictive man-crack. There was no other explanation.
“Stop your ogling, Emma,” he whispered.
Oh, believe you me, I wanted to. I truly did, but I just couldn’t help myself. “Ogling? Don’t think so. Just admiring your skirt. Trying to explore your feminine side?”
Guy ignored my comment, grabbed my hand, which turned me to warm maple syrup, and started toward Rosa’s cabin. He pressed his ear to their front door. I half expected he’d knock, but instead, he pushed open the door, pulled me inside, and slammed it shut.
The elderly couple was suspiciously unruffled by this sudden intrusion; they just sat at their rustic wooden table, sipping red wine.
“Ah, Emma. I see you’ve returned and brought a friend,” Rosa said dryly.
“Why aren’t you jumping up and screaming? There’s a menacing, half-naked man in your living room, holding me prisoner.” And, wreaking sexual havoc on my body.
Guy frowned. “You’re not a prisoner. I’m protecting you.” He turned to Rosa. “What do you want with the girl?”
“Girl? You’re the one wearing the skirt,” I said.
Arturo rose from the table, a cold expression occupied his face. “I don’t care what you are, you don’t come into our home and bark orders.”
Oh, hey. I like these people. A lot. Going on my Christmas card list.
Guy stalked across the room and then leaned over the old man. “I don’t have time for posturing. Start talking, or I’ll break your wife’s neck. Remember who you’re talking to and that of all my brothers, I am by far the deadliest.”
Did he just say he’d break that old woman’s neck? Wait. He had brothers? Run away, Emma, before he drags you to a family reunion, or kills you. Either one…bad. Very bad.
Arturo glanced at his wife who looked irritated but not frightened. Why?
I suddenly felt like they were all part of a secret club I hadn’t been invited to.
She gave him a quick nod and said. “We don’t want anything with Emma, but the Maaskab do.”
Guy’s body went rigid. “What do they want with her?”
“Who’re the Maaskab?” I asked. Of course, no one answered.
Rosa spoke, cutting off Arturo who was about to answer, “All I can tell you is that my sister was sent away when she was five. The elders feared she’d be taken.” She glared at Guy as she spoke. “Shortly after, the Maaskab began watching our village. They still do. And when we saw Emma, we recognized her immediately and called the other elders to decide what to do.”
“Who’s your sister?” I asked Rosa frantically.
Guy held up his index finger to silence me. I was about to give him a few choice words, but he cut me off with his powerful, lulling voice. “Are women still being taken”—he paused—“by the man?”
The man? Great. More secret code. This is getting ridiculous.
The couple shook their heads. “No,” Rosa said. “But we hear the Maaskab have been taking young women from remote villages as far south as Nicaragua.”
“Or they hunt anyone who carries the gene,” Arturo added, looking directly at me. “Although, I imagine there are few left.”
I swallowed hard. “Will someone please explain what the hell is going on?” I whined.
Rosa placed a warm hand on my arm. “Your grandmother, Gabriela, was born here. She was my older sister. The Maaskab want you because like her, you are a first born female. You carry the bloodline of—”
“Enough!” Guy slammed his fist on the table.
Enough? I carried something in my blood. Guy’s “bad people,” who I assumed were the Maaskab, wanted me for some horrible reason. And this woman was apparently my missing grandmother’s sister. But he was yelling “enough”?
“You have no right,” I screamed. “I need to know what’s going on!”
Arturo shook his finger at Guy. “You’ve brought the girl back here! The Maaskab probably spotted her already. And what they can’t see, their wards will detect.”
“She’s in no danger from a few crazy priests as long as she’s with me,” said Guy.
“Humph!” huffed Rosa. “You arrogant fool. Where have you been, locked in a cave?”
“Actually, a cenote,” I pointed out.
“Since 1940,” added Guy.
I turned to him. “Since 1940? Why am I not surprised you left that detail out?” I did some quick math. That would mean he’d m
et my grandmother when she was a small child.
Guy flashed me an irritated look. “Sorry to have forgotten such an important detail, Princess Emma, but I was busy…being cursed underwater!”
“So? Why the hell does that matter?” I replied. “It’s not like you were doing anything other than annoying the crap out of me…” my speech trailed off as my mind hit a wall. Had he really been trapped underwater for seventy-plus years? What the hell was he? And what the hell was going on? This couldn’t be real. It just couldn’t be. Maybe I was still back in New York, lying comatose in a hospital and this was all a dream.
Rosa shook her head. “The Maaskab have grown. There are thousands now—not including those who are loyal to them. The only thing keeping this girl safe was that they didn’t know she existed. But now, that’s likely over, and they’ll track her.”
“Sure. Why the hell not?” I threw my hands in the air.
“Haven’t the others been trying to stop them?” Guy asked cryptically.
“Others?” Rosa questioned. “What others? We haven’t seen any of you for sixty years, maybe longer.”
Guy rubbed his stubble covered chin. “I need to return,” he said. “I have to find out what’s happened to them.” He stared down at me, his bright, turquoise eyes narrowing in contemplation. “I need to put you somewhere safe. You can’t stay here.”
“This insane conversation is going nowhere. You people aren't interested in giving me any answers, so I see no point in sticking around, either. And since I’m pretty sure none of this is real anyway, I’ll just be dreaming my way home now. If I’m not dreaming, then I’ll need a good shrink. There are plenty in New York.” I started for the door.
“Emma, this isn’t a dream,” he lowered his voice to that hypnotic, skull penetrating tone. “And you cannot go home. If they know you’re here, they’ll follow you.”
Accidentally in Love With a God (2012) Page 8
