He released her at once, stepping around in front of her, his expression one of total calm, his breathing regular. It had been no effort for him to subdue her. As easy as swatting at a fly. “That’s why we have to practice,” he said, bending to retrieve the knife. He offered it to her again. “It’s too easy for someone to disarm you, and that’s not acceptable.”
She stared at the hilt of the knife a moment, catching her breath. It was a beautiful weapon, in a physical sense, the rich luster of the wood, the satin finish of the steel.
“Again,” Michael urged, and she took it with a grim resolution.
Over and over, he had her attack him. He showed her how to stand, where to place her feet for the best leverage and maneuverability, how to hold the knife, how to angle it. He showed her the soft, vulnerable places to stab, pointing them out on his own body, making her anxious at the idea of the knife piercing his skin.
“You can’t hurt me,” he said, time after time. And, “Again. Do it again.”
Never did she come close to him with the knife, and her frustration mounted, but she was getting quicker with the dodging, managing to stay out of his grasp, dancing away from him when he would have taken the knife.
And just as she felt she’d gotten the whole avoiding thing down pat, he sent the knife spinning out of her hand. It landed on the floor with a loud metallic sound. And in two fast moves he had her back against the wall, his forearm across her chest, his hand around her throat, his face shoved into hers so she could feel him panting against her skin.
“And now you’re getting strangled, just like your friend at the bar,” he said, his voice low and rough. His eyes were bright and full of sparks. She felt his pulse pounding in the hand that circled her neck.
Vulnerable and small, trapped by him, reminded so suddenly of Carly and the fate she’d suffered, Holly’s frustration gave way to a more desperate sensation.
“It’s not fair,” she gasped. “How is someone like me supposed to fight off someone like you?”
“You’re not.” He let his arm fall away, and his hand left her throat, slid down to press at the high center of her chest. His expression softened, but not his eyes. They were frightening, the way they shimmered in the dim lamplight. “You use the gun I gave you. And if you have to dodge them, then you dodge the best you can. And you run, Hol. Do you hear me? If you’re in danger you run. Don’t try to fight, don’t be brave, just run like hell, and start shooting when you have to.”
He leaned in even closer, until his eyes were all that she could see of him. Electric and pulsing, like her heart beneath his hand.
“Run,” he said again.
The tension rushed out of her, replaced with a quiet, throbbing anguish. Run, he said, run away from him.
“You wouldn’t hurt me,” she whispered. “I know you wouldn’t.”
He took a breath and let it out with a growl. And he kissed her.
She was ready tonight. Now, in the wake of the dazzling pleasure of the night before, she knew not to be afraid. She trusted him, understood the perfect magic of letting him in.
She opened her mouth against the pressure of his tongue, welcomed his consuming kiss with soft encouragement, hands finding his chest, kneading lightly at the hard wall of muscle.
He deepened the kiss, bearing down on her, walling her off from everything but him. He sucked at her lips. The scrape of his teeth was almost cruel. He was trying to get inside her, and wasn’t satisfied with his progress.
His hands went down into her sweatpants, shoving them to her knees. He was frantic. He was panting against her mouth and his hands were clumsy in his haste.
Holly understood. He was frightened, thinking about how incapable she was with the knife. And he was riled from the exercise, and the way it had brought them together again and again, arms tangling, bodies pressing together. And she knew that he didn’t understand, and that he was frustrated and aching and searching, and for those reasons, she couldn’t be afraid of him, even if he was rough.
She stepped out of the sweatpants and shimmied her panties down, kicked them off her bare feet. Then she reached for his belt, opened his jeans.
“Yes,” Michael said, a heated gasp against her throat. He grabbed at her hips, clutched at her ass, lifted her up against the wall so they were aligned, and he held her there, strong pressure at her hips, as he drove into her with one forceful thrust.
She felt it in every inch of skin, that sudden, violent joining. His face was against her chest and she shoved her fingers through his hair, clutching his head to her breasts, the worn cotton of her shirt. She wanted to enfold him, wrap him up and hold him, because that was what he needed, even if he thought it was just savage mating that he craved.
He was beyond kissing or gentleness, driving her hips back into the wall with each thrust, his ragged breath against the valley between her breasts, his fingers digging bruises into her hips.
Holly hadn’t expected the rippling excitement in herself, the rapid firing of all her nerves in hungry flashes. Breathless, she held him, as she felt herself melting, whispering against his hair. “It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay…”
He groaned, and then there was a change in him. A rotating, grinding rhythm as his hips drove against hers. He adjusted the way he held her, so his body curled around hers, supporting her weight, the angle of his penetration shifting so that…
She gasped. She latched onto fistfuls of his hair, straining against him as the sharp climb toward release began in her belly.
She was almost delirious by the time it ended, aware that he’d found his own pounding finish in the middle of her clutching and gasping, and that now he was lowering her to her feet, letting her back slide down the wall.
She was grateful for his hands on her waist because her legs didn’t want to hold her up. She leaned into him, grabbing at his shirt, trying desperately to catch her breath.
His face dropped into her hair, arms circling her.
It was a long moment before Holly could trust herself not to fall.
“Did I hurt you?”
Holly paused with her wineglass halfway to her lips. They were seated at the tiny café table by the window, so the colored lights of the Christmas tree played off the glassware and white plates, dinner laid out between them. Across the table, Michael’s brows were drawn together, looking miserable and worried.
As she stared at him, she wanted to go around the table and wrap her arms around him. But he didn’t seem the type for hugging. So she gave him her softest smile. “No, Michael. I’m fine.”
His eyes dropped, and he studied his salad. “I shouldn’t have done that,” he said, quietly.
Holly’s stomach fluttered at the words, but she was too weak and tired not to eat. She took another bite of lasagna and said, “Why did you?”
His gaze snatched up, even more miserable.
“I’m not saying you shouldn’t have,” Holly said. “I’d just like to know why, if that’s okay.”
He speared a cherry tomato and frowned at it.
“But we don’t have to talk about it,” she said, breezily. “We’ll talk about something else.” There were a thousand things she wanted to ask him, but she thought it would be best to stick to a neutral topic. “I wanted to ask you last night: what kinds of movies do you have on your shelves?”
He blinked, and glanced up at her with obvious surprise. He hadn’t expected her to ask about that. Good. She’d set him back. Hopefully she could refocus him, get them back on even footing.
“All kinds,” he said, popping the tomato into his mouth. She saw the instant relaxation in him. His body started to unclench.
“Do you have The Wizard of Oz? It’s on my to-watch list. I’m trying to cover all the classics.”
“You’ve never seen The Wizard of Oz?” he asked, brows lifting. Then, growing quiet and serious, tone grim, he said, “You’ve never seen The Wizard of Oz.”
She refused to let his mingled guilt and sympathy get to he
r in this moment. “No,” she said. “Is it as good as they say it is? Or is it one of those over-hyped situations?”
Michael shrugged. “It’s one of the big ones.” Still outwardly disturbed, he said, “What have you seen?”
“Well when I was in Nashville” – she bit at her lip, not wanting to mention the wannabe country singer who’d traded a few rolls in the hay for room and board, not now that Michael had so completely claimed her body – “there was the entire Adam Sandler library in the apartment. So I watched some of those. Big Daddy, Billy Madison.” She made a face. “Not exactly my favorites. But I found a secondhand store that sold used movies and books and things, and I picked up It’s a Wonderful Life, Citizen Kane, Gone With the Wind…”
“You weren’t kidding when you said ‘the classics,’ huh?” He gave her one of his bare smiles. They seemed so full of life and kindness, now that she knew him better. What had once been just a twitch at the corners of his mouth now brought giddy warmth up in the pit of her stomach.
“I’ve seen some newer ones, too. Love Actually–”
He made a sound in the back of his throat.
“Hey, I like that one. And The Notebook–”
“Jesus Christ.”
“But my favorites,” she pressed ahead, grinning, “are the old Universal monster movies.”
That set him back. “No kidding.”
“No. I love scary movies. Monster movies. They make…” The words died in her throat. Without intending to, she’d circled back around to the past. It would never, it seemed, relinquish its hold on her. Probably because it was galloping toward her all the time.
Michael’s expression was the most unique blending of sudden softness and intense anger. The dichotomy of the man; he couldn’t seem to feel for her without hating the men she’d fled. It was all a tangle, behind his eyes. “They make you feel better,” he finished for her.
She nodded and pushed the lasagna noodles around on her plate with the tip of the fork. “Yeah. It’s nice to pretend that monsters all have fangs and teeth and claws…”
Instead of ropes and beds and bibles.
Michael’s fork stabbed at the plate with a loud metallic strike as he speared up pasta. But his voice was modulated, a clear attempt at redirecting the conversation. “Have you seen Die Hard?”
Holly gave herself a little shake. “It’s on my list.”
He nodded as he chewed and swallowed. “That needs to be remedied ASAP. You have to watch Die Hard at Christmas.”
She chuckled. “Because it’s so festive?”
“It is,” he said, and she couldn’t tell if he was real- or mock-serious. “We’ll watch it tomorrow.”
Her face warmed. “We will?”
“Yeah.”
Holly hadn’t expected the simple pleasure of watching him eat food she’d prepared. Of seeing him casual in his socked feet in her home like this. By the time she stood to clear the dishes, she was glowing, and didn’t care if it showed. This was world’s better than all of her imaginings.
After she’d put the leftovers in the fridge, and returned to the table to refill Michael’s drink, he caught her gently by one forearm, hand going to the cuff at her wrist. His energy had tightened and intensified; his eyes were bright when they lifted to her face.
“You cover the scars with these.” Not a question.
She swallowed. “Yeah.”
He passed his thumb over the brass snaps of the closure. “Will you take them off?”
Holly took a deep breath, and sank slowly down to her knees, so her arms rested across his lap, fingers clasped against his denim-covered thighs. “I will,” she said as she looked up at him, “if you’ll do something for me.”
She felt needlessly brave and stupid, too bold asking for anything from anyone. Who was she to deserve the consideration of a man who’d already given her so much?
But he said, “Okay.”
“Will you…” She had to dampen her lips. His eyes were so focused, full of an ungodly intensity. “Will you take your clothes off? I want to feel you this time,” she whispered.
He nodded.
Then he eased her hands away, so he could stand.
“I didn’t mean you had to…” Holly started, and then trailed off, as he reached for the hem of his shirt. God, he was going to strip down right here, and all she could do was watch, mouth going dry as she knelt on the floor in front of him.
His torso stretched and flexed as he lifted the shirt clear of his head, abs and pecs and biceps leaping and then settling. The tendons in his vein-laced forearms flickered under the skin as his hands went to his belt. Buckle, button, zipper, and he pushed down his boxer-briefs at the same time, shucked his socks as he pulled the jeans off his feet. And then he was naked and beautiful before her.
He was hardening for her already.
Holly wasn’t sure it would ever not frighten her, just a little: that male organ in its nest of dark hair. But she liked the little trail of hair that tracked up to his navel. And she liked the firm lengths of his thighs, the crisp shape of his calves and ankles and his long, narrow-toed feet.
She unfastened the cuffs on her wrists and set them on the table.
His hand came down for her and she took it, let him lift her to her feet.
The blood was pounding in her ears, her breasts, between her legs as he pulled her into the bare hard length of him and kissed her. He was in complete control of himself this time, the hot stroke of his mouth deliberate, consuming, slow. He opened up her lips and feasted from her with florid, luscious movements of his tongue.
As the fire kindled in her chest, Holly melted. She curled her hands around his biceps, leaning into him, his hard cock trapped against her belly. “I can’t,” she whispered between kisses, incoherent and desperate. “I can’t…”
He knew. His arms were tight around her, holding her on her feet, his hand cupping the back of her head.
“I’ll carry you,” he said, and he did, lifting her up into his arms without effort and taking her to the bed, laying her down on top of the covers and settling over her, hot, and graceful, and heavy.
He nudged her legs apart and settled between them, grinding against her, so she could feel every inch of him through the screen of her pants. Her hips lifted automatically, seeking more explicit contact, craving the friction.
“What did you like best?” he asked against her mouth, voice a low, dark, breathy sound. “What was your favorite part?”
Last night tumbled through her mind in a blur of sensation: his hands, his mouth, his cock.
She arched breathlessly against him, clutching at his shoulders. “I like when you’re inside me. I like when we’re together.”
He gave a growling, groaning sigh and kissed her again, his hands going after her clothes. He swept her pants down, tugged them off her feet. She wasn’t wearing a bra, and he pushed her shirt up, hands closing on her breasts and kneading for long, tortuous moments.
Then he joined them, sinking slowly down, cock pressing, pressing, pressing in until he filled her.
Yes, this was her favorite part, when they were a part of one another. She loved his hot skin against her breasts and belly, the coarse hair of his legs and chest abrading her as he shifted languidly on top of her. A slow rhythm, hard flexing of his spine in patient, deep thrusts. Grinding against her. Crushing her down into the mattress.
She dug her nails into his back out of helpless reaction.
In a strained, tight voice, he said, “Just enjoy it, sweetheart. Let me make it good for you.” He breathed a laugh. “This is my favorite part too.”
And then she was gone, lost to the coiled power of his body as he worked against her. She closed her eyes and softened her mouth for his kiss, and she gave herself over to this wonderful invasion, the way he reached and reached inside her.
There was the most perfect moment, when she hovered, just before the peak. And then the orgasm shot through her veins like a narcotic. A wordless sound left h
er lips.
The heat spilling through her as he came too.
Michael heavy above her.
Exhaustion closing over her in the best way.
And then Michael was lifting her again, and then they were beneath her heaps of quilts, and she was lying against his chest, his heart thundering beneath her cheek.
Sleep was coming, but she struggled against it, trying to press this moment into her memory, leave a plaster cast for her permanent keeping. She would need to return to this night, in her mind, long after the job was done and she’d lost him, because she was fast realizing that ghosts or no ghosts, there was no bright future waiting for her if she didn’t have Michael.
Thirteen
“No, baby, you don’t understand.”
“No, baby, you don’t understand,” Mercy countered. He stood in the threshold of the kitchen, arms folded, smiling like a goofus as he watched her, clearly not understanding the severity of the situation.
“You know I think you’re adorable,” Ava said, sighing, as she turned to him.
He shrugged. “Naturally.”
“But you are so not right now.”
He feigned affronted.
“These cookies,” she continued, “are a reflection of me as a human being. If they’re all misshapen, it means I’m a sloppy mess of a person.”
“That’s stupid.”
“That’s my grandmother for you.”
“Tell her to go to hell,” he suggested.
“I can’t do that; it’s Christmas.”
“Okay, so let me do it.”
“Mercy!” She regretting snapping immediately, closing her eyes and swallowing down her useless, hormonal aggression. “I’m sorry,” she said, glancing at him again. “It’s just that...I haven’t visited with her since I got back home.”
He leaned back against the doorframe. “Since August? You moved back home and haven’t seen her at all?”
“No, and I should have, and she won’t let me forget that. Add to that all that’s changed…” She gestured between them.
“Please tell me she at least knows we got married.”
Price of Angels (Dartmoor Book 2) Page 21
