Choosing Rose (Other World Series Book Six)

by Ramona Gray

  “Feel how much I enjoy your kisses, flower.” He cupped her ass and pressed her against his erection before kissing her again. “I like the way you taste. Will you deny me your kisses?”

  “No, but I don’t want you to think you have to kiss me.”

  “I do not.” He kissed her a third time, this time cupping her breast and flicking at her hard nipple with his thumb. She moaned and rubbed her pussy against his cock. She wanted him so much. He kissed his way down her throat as he squeezed and caressed her breast. He was sliding his hand into her panties when he suddenly stopped and stared into the trees that surrounded them.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “The winged one is watching us.”

  “The what?” She scanned their surroundings. “Who’s watching us?”

  “The fat one with wings.”

  “Arden? I don’t see him.”

  She squinted in the direction that Vida was looking but still couldn’t see the fairy.

  “He is there.” Vida carried her back through the water until she could touch the ground again. “Tomorrow, I will give you another swimming lesson.”

  “Thank you.” Her body was going numb and her teeth were starting to chatter.

  Vida touched her mouth with his thumb. “Your lips are turning blue, flower.”

  He picked her up and carried her out of the water to sit on a large flat stone near the water’s edge. “Sit here and let the sun warm you for a bit.”

  “Will you sit with me?”

  “Yes.” He joined her, and she squeezed water from her shirt as he lounged naked beside her. The hot sun warmed her quickly and she grinned at Vida.

  “You’re pretty comfortable in your skin, huh?” She glanced at his cock. It was still half-hard and she had to resist the urge to lean over and take it into her mouth. Having Arden watch her give Vida a blow job wasn’t high on her list of fantasies.

  “The one named Patrick is mad,” Vida said bluntly. “You are to stay away from him. Do you understand?”

  She nodded. “Yeah, I know.”

  He sat up and cupped her face. “You are never to be alone with him. Promise me.”

  “I won’t. I promise.” She studied his face before touching his cheekbone with the tips of her fingers. “I like you, Vida.”

  He smiled, revealing his sharp fangs. “You please me as well, small flower.”

  She laughed. “Thanks.”

  Vida slid off the rock and put his pants on before filling the bucket of water. “Come, we should return to the others.”

  She put her pants on and slipped into her shoes. She took Vida’s hand and he squeezed it. “The others are here.”

  She looked up as Duncan and Teagan came out from the trees. She turned to Vida. “Holy crap. You have hearing like Superman.”

  “Who is this Superman?” Vida asked.

  Before she could reply, Teagan and Duncan had joined them. Teagan’s face was even more solemn than usual, and fear spiked in her belly. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing’s wrong,” Teagan said. “It’s time for breakfast.”

  “You came to the waterfalls to tell us it was time for breakfast?” Rose said.

  “Time to go back to the camp, Rose,” Teagan replied.

  “What if we say no?” Rose asked.

  “You and Vida are safer with us than on your own. You know that.”

  Rose glanced up at Vida. She had no doubt of Vida’s strength and his courage, but Teagan was right. They were safer with the camp, despite Patrick’s obvious lunacy.

  “He’s right, Vida.”

  “I will keep you safe, flower.”

  “Vida, the jungle is very dangerous. It’s better if we stay with others. We should be helping to keep each other safe. Do you understand?”

  Vida nodded but she had no real belief that he would stay at the camp much longer. It didn’t matter. If Vida left, she would go with him. She believed they were safest in the camp, but she would rather take her chances alone with Vida than stay with the others. Patrick was too unstable, most of the others hated her, and Solomon was having sex with Marissa. She didn’t want to face any of that without Vida.

  Hey, Rose, do you think maybe you’re getting a little too attached to a guy you just met? What do you know about Vida, really, other than he can make you come? Also, Vida’s into you now, but he thinks you can’t fuck him. How long do you think it will take before he gets tired of you, just like Solomon did? You can’t hunt, you can’t protect yourself, you have no idea how to survive in a jungle. The only benefit you provide to Vida is sex, and he believes it’s impossible.

  She took Vida’s hand and squeezed it as they followed Teagan and Duncan back toward camp. She would just have to convince Vida that she could have sex with him. And if it did hurt, she’d make damn sure he didn’t realize it.

  Chapter Eleven

  “So, are you and the big blue guy a thing or what?”

  Rose picked up a small carving of an elephant that was sitting on the ground near Brody’s furs. “Are you and Doc a thing?”

  Brody grinned. “Nah, we’re just banging every night.”

  She jumped up from his furs and gave them a suspicious look. “You could have warned me before I sat on your bed. And having sex every night is probably a thing.”

  “Is it?”

  Rose ran her finger over the elephant’s smooth back. “I think so. Where did you get this?”

  “Scott made it for me.”

  “Scott?”

  “Doc. His real name is Scott.”

  She smiled at him. “You have sex every night, he told you his real name and he’s giving you gifts. Forget thing, you two are a couple.”

  “Maybe we are.” Brody stared at the wooden elephant in her hand.

  “Good. I’m happy for you, Brody.”

  “Weird to think that I had to be sucked into an orb and stranded on an island in the middle of fucking nowhere to finally find a decent guy, huh?”

  She laughed and placed the elephant on Brody’s pillow. “Love happens in the strangest of places.”

  “You in love with the blue guy?”

  “His name is Vida.”

  “Sorry, are you in love with Vida?”

  “I barely know him.” Rose crossed her arms over her torso. “You can’t fall in love with someone you’ve only known for a few days.”

  “Fair enough. So, it’s just boning then?”

  She didn’t answer, and Brody touched her arm. “Hey, Rosie, look at me.”

  She stared up at him and he squeezed her shoulder. “What’s wrong?”

  “Vida and I aren’t a couple.”

  “You sure he knows that? He acts like you belong to him. He won’t let anyone else get near you, and I heard him telling you not to let Solomon touch you.”

  She shrugged. “He’s just, um, overprotective.”

  “I think it’s more than that.”

  “It’s not. We’re not even having sex.”

  “Seriously?” Brody blinked at her. “Why not? Is it Solomon? Because fuck that guy, Rose. He doesn’t deserve you. You’re into Vida, I can tell, and he’s definitely into you.”

  “We’ve done some stuff,” she admitted before pacing back and forth in Brody’s hut. “But, um, Vida’s a big guy which means he has a…”

  “Big dick?” Brody said with a grin.

  Now it was her turn to blush. “Yeah.”

  “Nice.” He held up his fist. “Don’t leave me hanging. Bump it, girl.”

  She fist bumped him before resuming her pacing.

  “If Vida’s got such a big one, why do you look like a woman who’s dating a small-dicked man?”

  She laughed. “God, you’re so crude, Brody.”

  He just grinned at her. “Spill it, Rosie.”

  She picked at a small scab on her forearm. “Vida says I’m too small to take his, you know…”

  “So what, you tried and it didn’t fit?”

  “He won’t even try.” She gav
e him a look of frustration. “He says he’ll hurt me if he tries.”

  “He knows women push babies out of their vajayjay, right? Wait… do his women even have muffs like human women?”

  “They do. They look like us, he says, only with horns and fangs and purple skin. But, they’re bigger and they’re warriors who can fight. Basically, everything I’m not.”

  “He still seems attracted to you.”

  “He is, and he says he wants to have sex with me, but he won’t risk hurting me. He won’t allow us to,” she paused, “mate as he calls it. It’s frustrating as hell.”

  “You need to change his mind.”

  “I’ve tried. It doesn’t work. And it’s not like I can pin him down and have sex with him when we’re, uh, making out. He’s got more muscles in his baby finger than I do in my whole damn body.”

  “Middle-of-the-night sex.”

  “I’m sorry?” She stopped pacing and stared at Brody.

  “You need to do middle-of-the-night sex. Listen, you know how you sometimes half wake up in the middle of the night to find your man’s dick hard against your ass? Maybe he’s sleeping, or maybe he’s only half awake too, but next thing you know, you’re having a round of sex when you’re both only sort of with it. That’s what you do to Vida. Get his dick into your happy place before he’s even fully awake.”

  “Do you really think that would work?”

  Brody nodded. “Yes.”

  “It’s worth a try,” Rose said thoughtfully. “Maybe he’ll realize that -”

  “Hey, babe? Did I leave my shirt in…oh, sorry, I didn’t realize you were still talking with Rose.” Doc stopped in the doorway of the hut. “I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

  “You didn’t,” Rose said. “I was just leaving to find Vida.”

  “He’s gone.”

  Rose’s heart dropped into her stomach with a hard, heavy, hollow thud. “He’s gone?”

  Doc nodded, and she swallowed down the bile before staring mutely at Brody.

  “It’s okay, Rosie.” Brody gave Doc a look of alarm and the blond man joined them.

  “Rose? Do you feel faint?” He pressed his fingers against the pulse in her wrist. “Your pulse is racing. You should sit down.”

  “I’m fine.”

  She wasn’t fine.

  Vida had left her.

  Vida had left her without even saying goodbye.

  “Did he tell you to say goodbye to me?” She croaked. Her throat was dusty-dry.

  Doc gave her a strange look. “He’s just gone hunting with Teagan, Wallace and Duncan. They’ll be back in a few hours.”

  Relief rushed through her. It was enough to make her knees wobble and both Doc and Brody grabbed an arm to steady her.

  “Maybe you should sit down.” Doc felt her forehead.

  “No, I’m okay. I just thought…it doesn’t matter. I’m fine.”

  “Vida did give me a message to give to you. He said he didn’t want to interrupt you while you were talking to your friend.”

  “What did he say?”

  Doc glanced at Brody. “To remember that the other males in the camp were not to touch you.”

  “Uh oh,” Brody grinned, “we’re gonna get the big blue guy beating the hell out of us.”

  “Oh, he made sure to mention that we were allowed to touch her as we were laying with each other, and had no interest in his small flower’s vagina,” Doc said with a cheeky grin.

  Brody burst into laughter as Rose turned bright red. “Oh my God. Oh my God, I’m so sorry. Vida didn’t mean… that is, he’s very blunt and not socially…”

  “It’s fine,” Doc said as he released her arm. “He’s not wrong. Listen, I’ll let you and Brody finish your discussion.”

  “No, we’re done. Thanks, Doc. I’ll give you guys your privacy.” Rose moved past them, her stupid legs still felt a little trembly, and out into the humid air of the jungle. She breathed deep and sat down on one of the logs around the campfire. She stared at the burning coals, her heart still thumping away in her chest like a frightened rabbit.

  Her reaction to thinking Vida had left her was alarming, but she hadn’t been able to control it. She rubbed at her forehead. Shit, what was happening to her?

  * * *

  “Why do you want to go with us?” Peter frowned at her before picking at the acne on his face.

  Rose ignored him and smiled at Brian. “Do you mind, Brian? I feel like it’s a good idea for me to better understand how the traps work.”

  Brian shrugged and picked up a second spear from the pile leaning against an empty hut. He handed it to her. “Fine with me. Let’s go.”

  “She’ll just slow us down,” Peter said. “Let her stay in the camp and do the woman stuff.”

  Before Rose could reply, Davis made a loud snort from where he was hanging wet clothing on the clothesline. “Are you fucking serious? You’re gonna pull that macho, chest-beating, women stay in the camp bullshit? If Rose wants to learn the traps, then she can fucking learn the traps. Everyone on this fucking sandtrap works together.”

  “Thanks, Davis.”

  “Don’t mention it, Rosie.” He gave her a quick salute before returning to hanging wet clothes.

  Peter gave her a sullen look. ‘We wouldn’t even be in this fucking mess if it wasn’t for you.”

  “Yeah, I know,” Rose said wearily. “It’s all my fault. Do me a favour and give it a rest just for an hour or so, would you, Peter?”

  “Whatever.” He followed Brian into the jungle and Rose followed him. She readjusted the wreath of flowers around her throat and gripped the spear in her right hand. Not that she had any real confidence in using it. Before she’d nearly died in the jungle and been rescued by Vida, both Brian and Duncan had given her some lessons with the spears, but she would be the first to admit that she wasn’t very good at it.

  She peered around as she followed Brian and Peter. She wouldn’t admit this, but she was only going into the jungle in the hopes of finding Vida and the others. They’d been gone much longer than their usual hunting expeditions, and her stomach was churning with worry. What if the pinkies had found them? What if they’d stumbled onto a blowcat with babies? What if – her stomach heaved – it was a trap set by Teagan, Wallace and Duncan and they had killed Vida?

  They wouldn’t. You know they wouldn’t. They’re good men.

  Yeah, they were. But they also followed Patrick’s rules.

  Patrick isn’t going to kill Vida. He needs his help.

  He did, but Patrick also was clearly off his rocker.

  Worry gnawing at her stomach, she gripped her spear a little tighter and followed Brian and Peter deeper into the jungle.

  * * *

  “Shit.” Brian bent and studied the broken trap. It was made from sturdy but flexible tree branches and he swiped his finger across the jagged edge of one broken branch. It came away red and Rose took a nervous look around.

  “Is that blood?” Peter asked.

  “Yeah. Something’s been breaking our traps and grabbing the animals in them.” Brian stood and pushed at the trap with his foot as Peter moved to the second trap that was at the base of a large clump of bushes that were almost twenty feet high. “We think it’s the bears.”

  “They have bears on this island?” Rose said.

  “Not quite. I mean, they kind of look like a cross between a bear and a rhino,” Brian said.

  “Wait, are they the things that Wallace calls brinos?” Rose asked.

  Brian nodded. “Yeah, not very original, I know. We really gotta stop letting him name stuff.”

  “What are you talking about?” Peter dropped the second trap. “This one is broken all to shit too.”

  “Brinos,” Rose said. “Wallace told us about them the second or third night we were on the island. They look like bears, but they have skin like a rhino and a big horn sticking out of their chest with a smaller one above it. Right?” She glanced at Brian for confirmation.

  “Yeah. They
usually don’t bother much with us. We thought they ate mostly fish, we’ve seen them wade into the ocean and catch them. Although Duncan saw one take on a blowcat and win, and he said the thing feasted on the blowcat’s guts afterwards.”

  “Maybe with the sharkgators so close to the shores for breeding, they don’t want to go into the ocean,” Rose said.

  Brian thought that over for a minute. “It’s a good theory. But if they keep breaking our traps, we’ll have to take them out. These traps aren’t easy to make, and Duncan is still the only one with any real skill at making them. Shit, the stuff that guy knows about trapping and surviving in the wilderness is impressive. We’d have been dead a long time ago if it wasn’t for him.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m starting to think you guys might be bullshitting us with your blowcats and brinos.” Peter kicked at the trap again. “We haven’t seen anything like that and we’ve been on the island for almost three weeks.”

  “I saw a blowcat this morning,” Rose said. “Vida and I saw it and her babies on our way to the falls.”

  Brian just rolled his eyes. “Whatever, dude. What possible reason could we have for making this shit up?”

  Peter shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t even know you, do I? For all I know, this whole sucked into an orb thing could be a hoax, and we’re on some island in the middle of our own world as some sort of fucked up social science experiment.”

  “Are you serious?” Rose said. “Peter, you worked at the lab for two years. You saw how the orb worked, you saw -”

  “Maybe we saw what they wanted us to see,” Peter said.

  “How do you explain Vida, then? Or the other creatures you saw come out of the orb? Or the fucking pink thing that ate John’s face off?”

  “Maybe they’re drugging us. Maybe they’re pumping us full of shit that makes us all mass hallucinate.”

  “You’re talking crazy, Peter,” Rose said.

  “Yeah, right. Because tigers that blow acid from their foreheads and bears that have horns like rhinos is so fucking sane. Just think about it for a minute, Rose. If people really -”

  “Peter? What’s wrong?” Rose took a step toward him as his face paled.