Oberon Boxed Set (Books 1-3) Welcome to Oberon

by P. G. Forte

  He surged into her repeatedly and she rose each time to meet him. The currents caught them up and took them deeper. Their breath came fast and then faster. He clutched her tightly to him, felt her nails bite hard into his shoulders. The urge to speak grew almost overwhelming.

  I love you!

  “Ryan.” Her voice was barely even a whisper, yet so filled with tender yearning that it made him dizzy just to hear it. “Oh, God, Ryan, I, I—”

  “I—” He felt his resolve begin to slip, heard himself start to speak and broke off on a groan. He quickly ducked his head, taking one taut nipple in his mouth. Almost immediately he felt her arch and give and break beneath him as the climax took her under. And then wave after wave crashed through them both at once. Creating a whirlpool of sensations that sucked him down, as well. Down to a place beyond reason or thought, but not beyond words.

  “I love you.”

  He lay on top of her, chest heaving as he gasped for breath. Feeling at once complete and oddly empty as the tension and the need which had been driving him dissolved like so much foam. Only one tiny trickle of unease remained to disturb the peace he felt.

  I love you? Oh, shit. Man, he’d really fucked things up this time. Unless... perhaps she hadn’t heard that? It had seemed a mere whisper of a sound anyway; barely audible amidst the noise of the storm that raged outside. In fact, now that he thought about it, he wasn’t altogether certain that the words had really come from him, at all. Maybe he only imagined that he’d said them aloud? Still, he found that he could hardly breathe while he waited to see what her reaction would be.

  But she gave no sign of having heard anything. She lay quietly beneath him, her hands sketching slow, contented circles on his back for what was beginning to seem like forever.

  Finally she spoke. “Ryan? You, uh, you’re getting a little heavy.”

  “Sorry,” he muttered, rolling to the side. She pulled the covers up from the bottom of the bed. He watched her intently. She was biting her lip and frowning to herself, and she seemed entirely too interested in how the blankets were arranged around their feet. She was fading away again, he was sure of it. She was slipping off into that mysterious internal world where he could never follow.

  “Give me that,” he said quietly, reaching for the blanket. She glanced up at him, her eyes wide and full of questions. He took hold of the blanket, and then grabbed hold of her arm, as well, pulling her back down beside him. “Come back here. Where do you think you’re running off to?”

  She looked at him for another long moment without answering. At last she shook her head. “Nowhere,” she said as she settled back down, laid her head on his arm and closed her eyes. “I’m not going anywhere, I guess. At least, not tonight.”

  He lay beside her, watching as her face relaxed and her breathing slowed. Still trying to adjust to what had happened, or nearly happened between them. I love you? Christ almighty, what had he been thinking? What had come over him tonight? He’d come so close to losing her earlier this evening and then—

  Oh, dear God.

  His heart hammered in his chest and the sudden roiling in his gut left him almost nauseous. Time froze as the reason for the panic he’d felt when he’d thought things were over between them, became clear. Damn. It was true, wasn’t it? He did love her.

  Her. Not just her hair or her eyes or the softness of her skin; the way she could be all cool elegance one moment, and aflame with passion in the next.

  It was all of that and more. He loved her gentleness, her patience, her strength. Her smile and her laughter, the sound of her voice.

  Even her sudden flashes of fury enthralled him – maybe because of the way her eyes sparkled and her cheeks glowed when she was angry. Or maybe because he admired her nerve. Here was one woman who would always go toe-to-toe with adversity, and never surrender, never back down.

  Absolutely everything about her captivated him. As it had right from the start. And, right from the start, he should have known that this could happen.

  In fact, now that he’d admitted it, he couldn’t help but wonder at his own surprise. He should have seen it coming. Like a slow moving freight train it had come lumbering down the tracks, giving him no dearth of opportunities to jump out of its way. Why the hell hadn’t he taken one of them?

  Had he wanted this? As unlikely as that seemed, somewhere deep inside he knew it to be true. And now? Oh, well, now all he had to do was figure out some way to make her want it, too.

  But not tonight, he thought gratefully. At least he didn’t have to do anything about it tonight. He waited until he was quite sure she was asleep. Then he leaned in close, brushed back the hair from her face and whispered, “I love you, Siobhan.” His lips just inches away from her ear—but so softly that not even his breath could disturb her. “I swear to God, I do. And somehow... somehow I’m gonna find a way to make this work for us. I promise.”

  * * * *

  Ryan awoke hours later with his heart pounding. Screams still echoed in his ears as he struggled to sit up. The wind howled outside the window, but it hadn’t been that which disturbed his sleep. There had been voices, too. Little kids’ voices, crying. He was almost sure of it.

  Jesus, what was happening? He reached for the bedside lamp and switched it on. Siobhan was already sitting up. Arms clasped around her knees, she rocked herself back and forth.

  “What’s going on?” His voice, still rough with shock, grated harshly in his ears.

  “Nothing,” she answered, not turning her head. “It’s just the wind, Ryan. Go back to sleep.”

  “Like hell. I heard voices.” Doubt assailed him. He heard nothing now but the wailing of the wind as the storm hurled itself at the cottage. And saying the words aloud made the whole idea seem even more unreal. “I think.”

  She turned to look at him, her eyes wide and wary in her tear stained face.

  “No,” she whispered, shaking her head firmly. “No, you couldn’t have. You’re imagining things, Ryan. You must be.”

  “Siobhan.” He gazed at her, trying hard to remember the sounds that had awakened him. She’d been crying. Maybe it was her voice he’d heard? “I don’t think I imagined it. What’s wrong?”

  Her eyes regarded him steadily. “What kind of voices?” she asked at last, cautiously.

  He shrugged and ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t know. Someone crying I think? Kids, maybe. Why? What’s going on?”

  She reached across him to switch the light back off, pushing him back into the pillows as she did. “I told you. It’s nothing!”

  He grabbed her wrist. “Leave it on,” he said. She glared at him as he brushed the hair back from her face. “Now, what’s this all about, huh? C’mon, let’s talk about this. Why were you crying?”

  “Talk about it?” Her words were a hollow whisper. “Funny, I would have thought— I mean, if you wanted to talk about something— Well, there might have been something we could have talked about earlier, you know.”

  He swallowed hard as he took in the stubborn set of her chin and the unexpected bleakness in her eyes. Is that why she was upset, because of what he’d said before? I love you. Jesus. Him and his big mouth. He should never have just blurted it out like that. How many times had she told him she wasn’t looking to get involved?

  “Look, Siobhan... I was tired earlier,” he told her, even though he knew how lame that had to sound. “Okay? And I’m still tired, so probably nothing I say is gonna come out right. But-”

  “Then let’s just turn off the light,” she said, her eyes pleading. “And go back to sleep.”

  “Not yet,” he insisted, with no clear idea on how to do this, but determined to at least make the attempt. “First... tell me why you’re awake.”

  She continued to eye him warily. “It was the wind. I have a hard time sleeping sometimes, when it gets like this. I start to- Well, sometimes I... sometimes I imagine I hear things, that’s all.”

  “Voices.”

  She nodded, her face
unhappy.

  “But if you heard them, too, then why-”

  “Because!” She pushed away from him and sat up. Her voice, when she spoke again, sounded more weary than he’d ever thought possible. “They’re just ghosts, Ryan. Dreams. Memories. Echoes from the past. Empty noises. They’re not really here, you know. In fact... they’re not even real! So just... just ignore them. Please.”

  “Ghosts?” He looked at her in surprise. What the hell was she talking about? She couldn’t be serious. “I don’t believe in ghosts.”

  For a moment anguish gleamed from her eyes, and then she turned her face away. A small, bitter smile curled her lips. “No. No, neither do I, actually.”

  “But you just said-”

  “Shh. Let’s not talk anymore.” With a sudden motion, she swept the blankets off the bed, leaving them both naked in the cool night air. His breath caught in his throat as he felt her hands slip between his legs to gently cup his balls. She was trying to distract him, he thought with sudden insight. And she could hardly have hit upon a better method. Still, disappointment mingled with the pleasure he felt as her hand closed around his shaft. He would have so much preferred to believe she was simply overcome with a sudden, uncontrollable desire for him.

  But he knew better. She glanced up at him swiftly, and he saw the speculation that glittered in her eyes. She was hiding something. A secret that could possibly destroy everything he hoped to build with her. But no. It wouldn’t come to that. He wouldn’t allow that to happen. And he wouldn’t allow himself to be manipulated, either. Not even like this. Not even by her.

  But then she was taking him in her mouth. Despite his misgivings he was already hard for her. Already craving more of her touch. “Siobhan, wait,” he gasped the words out stubbornly, even as he felt his resolve drain away. “Can we talk about this for a minute?” He reached for her, intending to stop her. But his hands clenched in her hair instead, and held her there. “Siobhan... oh, God, I-”

  Her tongue slid carressingly down the length of his penis and he shuddered in response. “Ghosts can’t hurt you, Ryan. I promise,” she murmured. Her breath was warm and wet against his skin as she repeated the caress. This time he felt the sharp edges of her teeth, as well. “Only the living can do that.”

  Ghosts, again? Oh, God help him, he had no idea what that was all about. And, at the moment, he didn’t much care. All he knew for certain, as her fingers tightened on him and his body succumbed to her relentless seduction, was that she was leaving him with very little choice. There was something she wasn’t telling him. And if she wouldn’t trust him with the truth, then he’d have to find some other way of learning what he needed to know.

  Her touch grew even more demanding and he speared his hands through her hair again, arching his hips and silently begging for more. He was almost mindless now, but he knew that later, when he could think again, the need to find out what was going on would reassert itself.

  She wouldn’t like it. He knew that, too. But much as he regretted that, it wouldn’t dissuade him. He loved her—more with each and every breath he took now—and in the end, he knew it was that which would take precedence over pretty much everything else. That, and the need to protect her from any danger that might threaten. But for right now... he gritted his teeth and closed his eyes as he gave himself over to all the heart pounding pleasure she could give him.

  * * * *

  Siobhan was still in the shower when the phone at the Nature Center rang early Monday morning. Ryan listened idly to her voice on the answering machine as he attempted to make coffee in the antiquated pot he’d unearthed in one of the cabinets.

  There was a long pause after the beep. Then a young male voice spoke hesitantly. “Siobhan? Hey, it’s Ray over at the lab. I’ve got some of the preliminary results from the water sample you brought in and, well... I think maybe you’ve got a problem.”

  “Yeah, no kidding,” Ryan muttered to himself, watching the coffee bubble in the glass bulb at the top of the pot. “Good call there, Ray.” He’d always hated it when people insisted on stating the obvious. But all the same, he listened a little more attentively as the voice on the phone continued.

  “We did a basic pH test and... well, you might want to check your chemicals. ‘Cause whatever you’re using to neutralize the chloramine, it doesn’t appear to be working. The levels are way too high, and... it’s kind of nuts But there were even traces of chlorine in the water when you brought it in. And, as you know, that dissipates pretty quick so...”

  “Shit.” Ryan switched off the heat under the coffee and grabbed for the phone.

  “Anyway, we’re still waiting on the results for the dissolved Oxygen Nitrate test but—”

  “Hey Ray, what’s up?” Ryan punched the machine’s off button so that the conversation would no longer be broadcast throughout the center.

  “Who’s this?” Ray asked suspiciously.

  “Ryan. I met you last week with Siobhan, remember?”

  “Oh, yeah. Right.” The relief in the younger man’s voice was audible as he continued. “Man, what’s going on over there? This water sample you guys dropped off is all messed up.”

  “How so?” Ryan asked, trying to control his impatience. After all, if there had been nothing wrong with the water, they’d have had no reason to check it out, now would they?

  “Well... and I know this isn’t the kind of mistake Siobhan would ever make, but could one of her volunteers’ve skipped the neutralizer, or something? Like I said, the chloramine levels... well, they’re pretty much right where you’d expect them to be if she were using water straight from the tap.”

  Ray paused for a moment. “And... I don’t know, but... there’s some kind of contamination, too. Like maybe the last time you guys cleaned the tank, someone might have used a sponge that still had traces of some kind of cleaning product on it? There’s just a lot of stuff that’s not supposed to be in here, if you know what I mean.”

  He didn’t, exactly, But “Okay. I got you. So, is that it?”

  “Well, no.” Ray’s voice took on an even more apologetic tone. “I mean, we’re still running tests but... well, she did say that this was a marine tank, right? Because if that’s the case, then, I gotta tell you, your salinity is way, way off. This water’s barely even brackish.”

  “Okay,” Ryan said, interrupting the flow of words. “Listen. Here’s what I want you to do, Ray. I’m gonna give you the number for my cell phone. I want you to call me direct when you get the rest of the results.”

  A moment’s silence greeted this announcement. “You mean you don’t want me to call the Center?” Ray asked cautiously. “Does Siobhan know about this?”

  “I’m handling this for Siobhan now,” Ryan said, firmly, in a voice that brooked no argument. “And until I have a better idea of what’s going on, I don’t want anyone else involved.”

  When Siobhan wandered into the kitchen a few minutes later, she was surprised to see Ryan puttering around in the cabinet under the sink. He had his jacket on, too, and that was also strange for this time in the morning. “Are you going somewhere?”

  He spun around to look at her. For a moment his face was grim. “Yeah,” he said, finally, his expression softening, somewhat. “I have a couple of errands I have to run this morning. You’ll be all right here on your own for a few hours, won’t you?”

  Her eyebrows rose. “Well, of course I will.”

  “I’ll feel better leaving the dog with you, anyway. Just in case.”

  The dog? She shook her head. “You really do need to give her a name, you know.”

  “I will,” he promised, getting to his feet with surprising ease, He grabbed a small paper bag off the counter. “I’ll give it my full attention, just as soon as I get the rest of this stuff straightened out.”

  The rest of what stuff, she wondered, feeling vaguely alarmed as he kissed her good-bye and very quickly left. His manner was a little too cool. A little too distant. He was hiding something. And it wa
sn’t all that hard to guess what that something might be.

  Saturday night she’d been so sure that he loved her – and so stupidly certain of her own feelings for him that she couldn’t keep from blurting it out. I love you. The words she’d whispered at the moment of climax still hung between them like an unanswered question. Yet, for two days he’d made no mention of it. Obviously, his continued silence on the subject was all the answer she was ever going to get.

  It wasn’t hard to guess what that might mean, either. When someone told you she loved you, there weren’t a whole lot of responses you could make. Either you loved her, too – or you didn’t. And if you didn’t love her, but still wanted to sleep with her, your selection of viable responses fell away to almost nil. Under those circumstances, saying nothing was probably the best you could do.

  “He loves me,” she whispered to the empty room. But no matter how often she repeated it, the idea seemed less and less likely all the time.

  Back to Top

  * * * *

  Chapter Twenty Two

  * * * *

  “Where are we going?” Jesse asked glumly from the back seat. “This isn’t the way home.”

  They were practically the first words he’d spoken since he’d gotten into the car at school. Sam thought, as he studied the boy’s reflection in the rear view mirror, but Jesse refused to meet his eyes. “I’m taking you guys out for a little after school snack. I figured it would give us a chance to talk.”

  Out of the corner of his eye he caught the appraising glance Frank slanted in his direction. Jesse shot him one quick, malevolent glare, before slumping back in his seat and turning to stare out the window. But neither boy said anything for the remainder of the ride out to the coast.

  Not like that was a surprise. For the entire past week the boys had been distant and uncommunicative. Especially Jesse, usually the more outgoing of the two.

  The boys were living full time with Marsha now while their father tried to adjust to the reality of an infant daughter, and their constant, brooding presence was putting even more of a strain on his rapidly cooling relationship with their mother. After spending a long, lonely weekend mostly by himself, Sam had reached a decision.