“Come on,” I said, my fear pushed aside by the desperate need to escape. “I’m taking a walk and I’m not going alone. Not after that truck outside last night.”
With a sharp-toothed yawn, she stood up and walked onto the rug.
“Bark worse than her bite, bark worse than her bite,” I muttered, taking what I hoped look like a confident step toward her.
She blinked up at me and let out a low growl.
“Yeah, yeah, you said that last night.”
As I tried to clip on her leash, she twisted her neck and started to walk backward. It wasn’t ideal, but it was a lot better than snapping jaws. “We can do this for an hour, or get it over with and go for a nice stroll in the eighty-degree heat,” I said in a soothing voice. “What do you say?”
She barked, but it was tempered by soft, scared brown eyes. “Oh, Diesel,” I said, going down on my knees in front of her. “I know just how you feel.”
As if to say the hell you do, she broke free and ran behind the couch. That only made me more determined. Something would go my way this morning, whether Diesel liked it or not. But how would I make that happen?
With food, that’s how.
I went to the refrigerator and yanked open the meat drawer. Tearing off a big, raw hunk of bacon, I cooked it on a paper towel in the microwave and brought it to the living room.
“Lunchtime,” I said in my highest voice. “Come and get it.”
Three minutes later, we were walking out the front door together like I’d raised her from a puppy.
CHAPTER NINE
What, exactly, did I remember?
Waking up in the park thirsty, my head aching. Maybe it was a hangover. But when I tried to think back, my mind hit a wall. Hard as I tried to climb over it, it kept getting higher and I kept slipping down.
I remembered walking, the endless search for something that made sense. Everyone who went by seemed to stare at me, as if they knew something I didn’t. I took off my clothes in a diner bathroom and studied the labels. White Vince t-shirt, faded Levi’s shorts, b.tempt’d panties. Chipped red fingernail polish, orange flip flops – none of it told me anything.
I drank out of public drinking fountains and took what little food I could from rural grocery stores and gas stations. Wrong as it was to steal, I couldn’t bring myself to beg. I might not have a memory, but I’d rather go to jail than have people look at me with pity.
Diesel strained at the leash, barking at something in the distance. Fear slithered through me, then disappeared. Whoever had come around last night was probably long gone, I hoped.
I looked back at the house, which had been a tiny spot in the distance just a minute ago. Now it was gone, obscured by the shimmer of heat. Diesel drank from a narrow creek that would probably be dry by next week. I swigged from my water bottle and let her pull me toward the horizon, probably an attempt to escape the leash more than anything else.
After half an hour of walking, I sat on a flat rock. Diesel sat beside me, keeping her distance but not glaring at me or growling.
I tried to keep my mind blank. For now, I wouldn’t think about what I knew. I had a few nearly-invisible marks that could be from a growth spurt, or gaining a little weight.
I might have a child, I might not. Maybe I had a husband, maybe I didn’t.
Nothing was certain, and that was the only thing I could say for sure.
Scrambling to her feet, Diesel let out one short bark. I saw a plume of dust spinning along the desert floor and rising slowly into the air.
A car, driving in my direction.
There was no road, but whoever it was had to be driving fast. First it was a black spot, then a shiny grill, and all of a sudden it was Drex’s truck, about to drive right by me.
Diesel barked frantically. I stood and waved my arms, much happier to see Drex than I should have been. But I’d walked too far, and missed him more in the last three hours than I wanted to admit.
Tires burning into the dirt, the truck jerked to a stop. Drex stared at me through the dusty windshield, not returning my smile. There was no mistaking his expression. He got out of the truck and slammed the door, his face rigid.
“What’s the matter?” I asked.
“What?” he snapped. “What did you say?”
“I said –”
“I got back to the house an hour ago. What the hell did you think you were doing, taking off like that?”
I was stunned silent. So this was Drex angry – and really, really sexy. His hard muscles rippled under a white cotton button-down, and his faded jeans seemed designed to make me a stammering idiot.
“I , uh…I needed to go for a walk and clear my head,” I said. “Diesel needed a walk, too.”
“I took her out this morning.”
“She’s a big dog. She needs exercise.”
“I thought you were afraid of her.”
“I am.”
His eyes narrowed. “This isn’t about the dog. Christ, Jane, I just found you wandering around town yesterday.”
“I didn’t think about it. I just had to leave the house.”
“Why? What would make you go out and wander around the desert without even leaving a note?”
“I’m…” I felt pinned under his fiercely dark gaze.
“You’re what?”
I wanted to tell him what I’d seen in the mirror, but the words stuck in my throat. He was all I had. I couldn’t push him away, or disappoint him, or lose him. Not yet. Not until I knew who I was and how I ended up here.
“It’s been a stressful time, that’s all. Can’t you understand?”
He sighed and dropped his head back. “Of course. But did you have to do something like this? Who knows who was out here last night, or what they could do to you.”
“You’re right,” I said. “I’m sorry. It was inconsiderate.”
He frowned. “Inconsiderate? How about reckless? Thoughtless? Totally rude?”
“Okay,” I said, forcing down my temper. “Anything else you want to add while you’re at it?”
He glared at me. “Careless. Dangerous. Dumb.”
“Dumb?”
“Very. Now, get in the truck.”
Now that he knew I wasn’t dead, he was right back to giving orders. “First, tell me where you were. You said you’d gone to take care of business.”
He opened the passenger door. “I did.”
“You can’t get more specific than that?”
“Do I need to, Jane? I’d think you’d just be grateful I came looking for you.”
“I am. I’m also wondering what was so important that you couldn’t wait to leave until I woke up.”
He jabbed a finger at me. “You.”
Now he was talking in riddles. “What?” I asked, shaking my head.
“What was so important was you.” Crossing his arms, he leaned back against the cab of the truck. “I went to see a friend of mine, a detective I’ve known since we were kids. And unfortunately, there’s no missing person’s report that matches your description.”
“Unfortunately?” There was only one way to interpret that word in this context, and it wasn’t good.
He wanted me gone. I was a complication, a distraction. A fuckable one, maybe, but a distraction nonetheless. “I’ll leave today,” I said. “I won’t bother you again.”
He put up both palms. “Whoa, whoa, wait a minute. Who said anything about you leaving?”
“You did, by going to the police.”
“Jane, sweetheart, you’ve got this all wrong.”
I tried to cram my hands into the pockets of the shorts I’d borrowed from Drex, but there weren’t any. “Like hell, I do. You went straight to the police this morning, hoping somebody was looking for me so you don’t have to deal with me anymore. And you know what? I don’t blame you. You didn’t plan on this. You thought I was just some…nutjob in distress.”
He took a step toward me. “That doesn’t mean I regret it. Did last night feel like regret
to you?”
“The morning after is a totally different thing.”
“Not to me,” he said. “Nothing’s changed.”
How seductive those words were. I wanted to believe them, but our brief history had shown that Drex could convince me of almost anything.
“Nothing’s changed?” I said. “There’s no missing person’s report. That seems like a pretty big change to me.”
“We’re back where we started from, that’s all. Right?”
After a long pause, I forced myself to answer. “Right.” But we weren’t back where we started from. Not after what I’d seen in the mirror.
“Come on, Diesel,” he said, taking her leash from me. “Get in the back.”
Eyebrows twisted, she stared at him as if he’d caught fire.
“I think that means no,” I said.
“No isn’t an option anymore. She needs to learn that.” Biceps flexing through his shirtsleeves, he grabbed all eighty or ninety struggling pounds of her and plopped her in the back on a huge dog bed. She stood on it and stared defiantly at both of us.
“Lie down,” Drex said. I knew that tone of voice, and it was almost impossible to refuse. After an ear-splitting bark, she spun around slowly and tucked her legs under her body.
Drex turned back to me and jerked his thumb toward the passenger door. “Now it’s your turn. Let’s go back to the house.”
I had the impulse to argue, but couldn’t figure out what to argue for. The right to stay out here by myself with my stomach grumbling and my water running low? “Fine,” I said, giving him an annoyed smirk.
As soon as we got into the truck, he grabbed me by the upper arms. “Come here.”
“Why?”
“Because I said so.”
He kissed me, a long, hard kiss that evolved into something soft and wet.
“Don’t resist me,” he said as I instinctively put both palms against his chest. “Give me what I want.”
“Isn’t this what you want?”
“Oh, no. It’s only the beginning.”
“I guess that means you forgive me.”
“Maybe,” he said. “You’ve still got some apologizing to do.”
“I’ve already said I’m sorry.”
His eyes were dark and dangerous. “I don’t mean with words.”
He unzipped his jeans and pulled out his cock. It was even more lust-worthy in bright daylight – long, ridged with veins, almost too thick to get my hand around. Which meant that taking it in my mouth would be a challenge.
With a groan of pent-up need, he pushed my head down toward his lap.
“What’s the rush?” I teased, squeezing his shaft until it throbbed.
“If you knew how sexy you are right now, you’d know.”
“Hm,” I said. “Shorts, t-shirt, sweat – I’m not convinced.”
He ran his finger over the glistening head of his cock and wet my lips with the salty drops. “Taste that,” he said. “And look at me while you do it.”
Raising my eyes to his, I ran my tongue slowly over my lips. He gave me a wicked smile. “Are you convinced now?”
“Getting there,” I said. “I think I need another taste.”
“There’s always more where that came from.”
As soon as I took him in my mouth, he let out a loud groan. “Fuck, that’s amazing,” he said. “You’re just too gorgeous.”
I covered my teeth with my lips and slowly slid the full, broad length of him, teasing him, letting him suffer. Every time he tried to thrust I pulled back, letting him know who was in control.
“Come on, give it to me,” he said, grabbing my hair and pulling me against him. “Suck it hard.”
Instead, I licked him slowly, holding my head steady, letting him feel the frustration. The wind howled, whistling through the cracked window and shaking the truck. Dust whirled and sweat broke out on my upper lip. The whole cab was filled with the seductive aroma of sex. I was so aroused I could have come just from the primal male smell of him.
“Take off those shorts and straddle me,” he said. “I’m going to fuck you right now. I can’t wait anymore.”
“That makes two of us.” I pulled the shorts to my ankles and kicked them off. Maneuvering around the steering wheel, I planted one knee on either side of Drex’s hips.
“That’s it,” he said, yanking the t-shirt up to my shoulders. “Give me your sweet pussy.”
As he penetrated me with his thick tip, I let out a ragged cry. The pleasure shot through me, a hard, wild jolt. It was wrong, it was probably terrible and immoral, but I needed him desperately.
Right now he was everything, the man who’d saved my life. My body couldn’t live without him.
“I thought you were mad at me,” I whispered.
He clawed his fingers into my hips and held me still, letting me feel the full length of his cock. “I am.”
Lowering his head, he sucked my nipples, flicking them with the firm tip of his tongue. Bright pink and beyond sensitive, they peaked in his mouth. I felt every sensation like white-hot electricity between my legs. My breasts were heaving from the dry heat, and the feeling of being possessed by a man who didn’t take no for an answer.
“Get on your knees,” he said, lifting me by the waist. Clumsily, I slid away from him and knelt on the passenger seat, ass toward him in the blazing sunlight. “Is this what you want?” I asked.
He pressed himself against me and grabbed a handful of my hair. “I want that and a lot more. Are you ready to take me?”
He was so big and thick that “ready” wasn’t exactly the word. He didn’t wait for my answer, anyway, he just forced himself inside me in one stiff, fast thrust.
“There,” he said, smacking my ass so hard the sound rang through the cab. “That’s what you need, isn’t it?”
The pain lasted only a second, but the pleasure felt like it would go on forever. With every smooth drive, my thoughts released and the future evaporated. I was nothing but sensual energy, all of it directed at Drex. I could live forever just like this, with no care for who I was or the hard fall that might be around the corner.
He pressed himself to my back, his sweat and mine mingling to make our skin sticky. “You like that?” he growled in my ear. “Does my big cock feel good inside you?”
“It’s incredible,” I said. “I need this so much.”
“I know. Almost as much as I do.”
He reached for my clit and stroked it softly with the pad of his finger. It felt like a sweet, sharp burn, a searing warmth that spread through my belly in a sudden wave. The combination of heat and wet and exquisite pressure was too much – I was going to come fast and hard.
I wanted to draw it out but I couldn’t stop it. It was too much. He was too much.
“Drex, yes,” I whispered as he drove into me. “That’s so good. Touch me, just like that.”
I glanced up for a second and saw my reflection in the passenger window – flushed face, parted lips, glassy eyes. And behind me, the sexiest man I could imagine in this life or any other, biceps bulging, skin glistening, fucking me for all he was worth.
He was a rocket inside me, a fire about to explode. My stomach muscles clenched. I couldn’t wait. I couldn’t stop. A scream ripping from my throat, I came with a rush so intense it blocked out everything else – guilt, doubt, the past. Nothing mattered but Drex, his cock, and the orgasm he was practically killing me with.
I shuddered and moaned, my vision coming to a sharp point as everything in the world disappeared. If I’d ever felt anything so consuming, I was surprised I’d survived it.
“Keep coming,” he whispered. “You’re so tight I can feel it all, every little quiver.”
Any moment now he would stop stroking my clit, except that he didn’t. He wasn’t going to let me stop coming until he was good and ready.
“Drex, no,” I begged. “I can’t.”
“You can and you will,” he said, his mouth against my ear.
Aga
in and again his fingers caressed me, leading me to pleasure and pain and beyond. A shiver drove through me as one orgasm built on the other and shook me to the core.
“Please,” I whispered, though I didn’t know what I was begging for.
“What a good little comer you are,” he said. “So good at following orders.”
Though I’d had the orgasm he’d demanded, he was ruthless, unstoppable. Sweat trickled down my neck as he flipped me onto my back and propped my right heel on the dashboard.
“Stay like that,” he said. “Wide open for me. Just for me.”
Just for me. We both knew it was impossible to say I was just his, but it felt so good anyway.
I reached back and grabbed the armrest with both hands as he plunged inside me. His shirt hung open, revealing the chest that must have made the panties of a hundred women go up in smoke. My breath caught as he threaded his fingers through my hair and pulled. I arched my neck, letting him feast on it, suck, bite, and nibble.
His cock grew inside me, stretching me almost beyond what I could take. I was panting, desperate to feel him come inside me. For all I knew, this time would be the last.
And if it was going to be the last, then let it be the most amazing moment I would ever experience.
Lifting my hips, I urged him deeper. “I love the way you fuck me,” I said.
“That’s why you’re not going anywhere,” he said, his eyes piercing into mine. “You’re going to stay right here, like this.”
“For now,” I said.
“For as long as I say you will.”
He was so sure of himself and so determined, I couldn’t argue. And I didn’t want to. All I wanted at this moment was him.
“You have no idea how beautiful you are,” he said, his voice deep and gravelly.
“You’re right,” I said, breath jolting out with every thrust. “Maybe you should show me.”
“That’s exactly what I’m about to do.” Eyes half-closed, he slammed hard and groaned. “Are you ready for my come?” he whispered. “There’s a lot of it.”
“I can’t wait.”
It would be the third unprotected time in less than twenty-four hours. I knew where babies came from, and I knew this was risky. But God help me, I needed Drex more than I needed to be safe, and sensible, and all the other things that apparently weren’t in my nature.
Descended (The Red Blindfold Book 3) Page 8
