by BETH KERY
“You’re really just going to leave Dylan Fall standing there in the woods, waiting for you?” Kuvi demanded, sounding amazed.
“You said I needed space to examine this thing with him,” Alice said over her shoulder.
“I never said that. But if you aren’t going to meet up with Fall tonight, maybe that’s what you needed to hear.”
Alice plunged into the bathroom, too overwhelmed to say exactly what she needed at that moment.
Too overwhelmed to know.
SHE checked the bedside clock as the illuminated dial changed from 12:02 to 12:03. She’d only slept in the counselors’ cabin that first week during her training, before she’d taken up with Dylan. Kuvi was silent in sleep. The complete quiet unnerved her, for some reason. It seemed to increase the volume level of the thoughts in her head to shouts. She’d lain in bed for the past two hours, the room draped in darkness, wakeful and alert.
Miserable.
What was Dylan thinking about her refusal to meet him at their assigned spot in the woods? Every minute of the past two and a half hours had been spent asking herself that question, over and over. The fact that she couldn’t fasten on any sure answer only added to her insomnia.
She flipped over to her other side, leaning up on her elbow to restlessly punch at a flattened pillow. She paused at a squeaking noise, going on high alert with her fist planted deep in the feathers.
The outer screen door gave another screech. Her heart jumped into her throat at the sound of the lock sliding back. She heard the soft sigh of the front door opening and then the quiet thud as it shut again. Alice sat up in bed, her back ramrod straight, prepared to fly off the far side of the bed.
The overhead light came on.
Dylan stood just inside the room, his hand still on the light switch. In his other hand she noticed he held a ring of keys. Of course he had a key to this cabin. He owned this property, didn’t he?
They’d been having a cool spell. He wore a pair of jeans and a soft-looking denim shirt that stood in marked contrast to his long hard body. His jaw was shadowed with whiskers, giving him that dark piratical look she loved, but which also intimidated her. His mouth was pressed into a grim line.
Her stunned brain left her temporarily mute.
“Let’s go,” he said simply.
“What?” she squeaked, her voice just above a whisper. Both she and Dylan glanced over at Kuvi’s bed. Shit. Kuvi was sitting up partially, rubbing her eyes and staring incredulously at the vision of Dylan Fall standing in their cabin.
“Sorry to wake you,” Dylan apologized. “This will just take a moment. Alice?” he addressed Alice levelly. “I waited until the camp was quiet, but I’m not going to wait anymore.”
“You can’t just break in here and expect me to get up and go with you!” Alice exclaimed, barely managing to keep her voice at a low volume.
“I do expect it. Because that’s what we agreed to, wasn’t it?” he asked quietly, taking a step toward her, the glint of anger in his shining dark eyes making her skin roughen in trepidation and mounting excitement. Yes. Excitement. The sight of him in her cabin, so solid and beautiful and demanding thrilled her, despite it all. “I agreed to let you go on as if everything was normal, as long as you agreed you’d spend the nights and weekends with me up at the castle. You’ve broken your promise tonight.”
She glanced anxiously at Kuvi, who was now watching their tense exchange with wide hazel eyes.
“You don’t have to worry about Alice,” Dylan said to Kuvi, a small smile curling his mouth. “She made an agreement with me.”
Alice gritted her teeth in the silence that followed as both of them looked at her expectantly. “I’m not going with you,” she insisted.
“Would you like me to carry you?” Her anxiety ramped up when she couldn’t gauge if he was joking or not.
“Just try it,” she hissed.
“Maybe you’d prefer I spent the night here then?” Dylan asked, taking another step toward her bed.
She cursed under her breath and threw off the covers.
“Convenient of you to go to bed dressed,” Dylan said when she stood jerkily, his gaze running over the length of her in what struck Alice as an insolent manner. He was insinuating she’d known he was going to come and claim her like some kind of caveman. She was wearing a pair of soft running shorts and a T-shirt.
“It’s what I wear to bed.”
His slight shrug seemed to say it all. Not anymore, you don’t. He knew perfectly well she didn’t wear a thing to bed when she was with him.
“Alice?” Kuvi asked uncertainly.
“It’s okay,” Alice assured, glaring at Dylan all the while. Kuvi couldn’t know that she and Dylan verbally sparred like this at times, and that it was harmless.
Well. Relatively speaking, anyway.
She stalked over to the bathroom and shut the door behind her with a muted bang. She’d left her tennis shoes in there earlier. Let Dylan stew in uncertainty about what she was doing. He was far too smug in his confidence that she’d go with him.
He was far too right.
After she’d washed her hands and face unnecessarily, she swung open the bathroom door now wearing socks and shoes. Dylan glanced over her, pausing in whatever he’d just been saying to Kuvi. Her roommate sat up in bed, her sheet fastened beneath her armpits. She looked much more calm and was even smiling. Whatever Dylan had been saying had reassured her.
Dylan’s gaze dipped to her tennis shoes.
“Kuvi said you’d told her about us. If you trust her, I do. She told me where your keys were,” Dylan said, holding up Alice’s key ring. “We’ll lock up behind us.”
Alice gave Kuvi a “thanks a lot, traitor” glance. Kuvi made a helpless face and shrugged. Alice rolled her eyes. She couldn’t really blame her roommate. Not many could resist Dylan’s charm and smoldering good looks when put to the test.
She certainly couldn’t, she acknowledged to herself bitterly as her hand slid into his and Dylan shut out the light. No matter how high the stakes, she couldn’t say no to him for long.
She followed him out of the cabin, their hushed, furtive movements once again joining them somehow. The power of their shared bond seemed to vibrate in the still air as they moved stealthily down the path to the coverage of the woods. Or maybe it was the knowledge of Dylan’s anger and concern in regard to her edgy behavior today and her own highly volatile state that added to the sense of electricity crackling between them. Her anxiety boiled up in her until she couldn’t suppress it anymore. She halted, pulling on Dylan’s hand once they reached the unlit trail leading toward the stables.
“Don’t ever do that again,” she challenged quietly.
“Don’t you ever do that again. Defy me if it makes you feel more in control, Alice, but don’t think I’m going to roll over if you deny me this.”
She swallowed thickly at his quick, succinct reply. It’d obviously been right on the tip of his tongue. He’d made it clear he would only agree to her resuming her life as a counselor at Camp Durand if she spent her nights with him at Castle Durand. She was reminded yet again of how anxious he’d been for her safety. Not just tonight.
For twenty years of his life.
Dylan seemed bizarrely convinced that a threat to her safety still remained. It was like after all those years of worrying, he couldn’t stop the habit now.
When she didn’t reply, he resumed their hasty, silent journey through the dark night. Their terse exchange had only amplified the tension between them. Alice’s heart began an erratic race. When they reached Dylan’s bedroom, she knew what was going to happen. Their frothing emotions would find an outlet in volatile lovemaking. She dreaded it.
She wanted it so badly, it felt like she’d shatter from the force of her need.
SIX
She and Dylan didn’t speak during the increasingly familiar, dark, furtive trek through the woods, up the slope of the hill and through the terrace doors of Castle Durand. He didn’
t even utter a word once he’d closed his bedroom door, locked it, led her to the side of his bed and switched on a lamp to a dim setting.
Nor when he silently began to undress her.
By that time, Alice trembled from the force of anxious desire.
She reached to help him unfasten her bra, but he merely grasped her wrists and placed her arms back at her sides. She looked up at his face, seeing his fixed expression as he watched himself undress her. He was still angry with her. She could see it etched on his bold rugged features. She was still angry with him.
But as always, this electrical need, this inexplicable pull they experienced for one another, trumped everything else.
Despite his obvious irritation at her, his touch was gentle as he unfastened her bra. His fingertips lightly skimmed the side of her breasts as he removed the cups. She winced reflexively, her nipples pulling painfully tight, even at that subtle caress of skin against skin. She noticed his gaze on her bared breasts and shut her eyes, embarrassed and aroused by the exposure, knowing he witnessed the sharpness of her need.
By the time he’d fully undressed her and she stood before him naked, her trembling had amplified.
“Lie down on the bed,” he said.
Relief swept through her at his demand. Lying down, perhaps he wouldn’t notice her shaking. The sense of relief intensified when she reclined against the pillows, and he reached into a bedside table drawer, lifting out two black cuffs with attached straps.
It both soothed and aroused her, to feel the soft leather against her wrists . . . to feel their strength and solidity. She’d resigned herself to the fact that surrender was her only option when it came to Dylan. It helped, though, knowing that with the restraints, she had no choice but to submit.
He restrained her wrists to the bed. When he was done, she lay naked with her arms above her head, her elbows bent slightly and resting comfortably on the pillows. He straightened upon finishing his task and paused next to the bed, looking down at her bound body . . . taking his time.
Something in his gaze made her eyes clamp tight again.
So hot. So possessive.
He came down over her, still fully dressed, and straddled her hips on all fours. She made a muffled sound of arousal when she felt him plant his hands on the mattress above her shoulders, and knew he towered above her.
“Look at me.”
He said it bluntly, a hint of impatience in his tone.
She stared up at him, trying desperately to even her choppy breathing. He held her gaze as he bent his arms. His dark head lowered. She cried out in helpless, cutting arousal when he sucked an erect nipple into his mouth and laved it briskly with his tongue. He lifted one hand and molded the breast on which he sucked, his actions focused and greedy. Her hips shifted restlessly on the bed as arousal swelled between her thighs.
“Dylan,” she called desperately after a moment, but he was lost in his task of consuming her. He squeezed her breast lasciviously while he tortured her nipple with his tongue. He kissed her flushed skin with gentle, worshipful lips, then sucked on her again hungrily. Alice writhed beneath him, moaning his name until her cries grew desperate.
“What?” he asked abruptly, and she realized her chanting of his name had finally breached his single-minded lust.
She unclenched her eyelids, her breath catching at the vision of him. He held both of her breasts in his large hands possessively. His mouth was twisted slightly in a snarl—not one of anger, Alice recognized, but one of interrupted appetite. The globes of her breasts looked pale next to his hands, the nipples reddened and damp. She nearly shut her eyes again at the potency of the vision.
“What is it?” he repeated, his thumbs sliding slowly over her nipples.
She struggled to capture the ends of her fraying purpose.
“I’m not sure I trust you,” she accused in a tight whisper.
She almost bit her lip to still her anguish when his stroking thumbs stilled on her damp nipples.
“What do you mean?” She experienced a blast of the cold sharp anger Sebastian Kehoe must have felt this morning coming face-to-face with Dylan’s wrath.
Why had she felt the need to tell him now, in this intimate moment? She was so raw. So vulnerable to him.
That’s why you did it.
“Alice?”
She shook her head on the pillow. “I realized it today. That’s why I didn’t meet you tonight.”
His expression darkened. “What happened? Did someone say something to you? Jim Sheridan? Kehoe?”
“No. It’s nothing like that. No one said anything to me. Why did you have to act like a paranoid Neanderthal today in the woods? Don’t you trust Jim Sheridan? I thought you were friends.”
“We are friends. And I do trust him. I had my reasons, Alice.”
She waited for the rest, her brow cocked. She sighed in frustration when he remained silent and implacable.
“There. That’s why I don’t trust you. You keep things from me. Still. Besides . . . I’m not sure I trust anyone. Not completely.”
Her defiant words sounded feeble to her own ears. They seemed to hang in the air between them, inadequate and limp.
“Do you want to be here? With me?” he asked.
“You know I do. I’m just so confused.”
“Do you think I don’t know what it’s like? To be told to trust, just because an authority figure tells you to?” He shook his head. “I’m even more accomplished at doubting than you, Alice.”
His gaze lowered over her throat and chest, to where he held her breasts in his hands. Her nipples prickled at the weight of his gaze.
“Your body trusts me. Even if your mind doesn’t,” he said grimly after a moment. “For someone like you—for someone like us—trust doesn’t come wholesale. It comes in stages. And this”—he nodded at her flushed, naked body—“is a start.”
She knew what he meant. He’d had it every bit as rough as Alice growing up. Both of them had learned the hard way that to trust was to eventually hurt.
To not trust hurt, too, though. Dylan was teaching Alice that lesson for the first time in her life.
“I’m sorry,” she said miserably, because she’d seen the flicker of pain on his face when she’d said she didn’t trust him, despite his tough response. She’d caused him pain, and that knowledge hurt her, in turn. “I just thought I should tell you. It only seemed fair.”
“But you came tonight. For this?” he asked, and his hands on her breasts tightened slightly.
“Yes.” She bit her lower lip when he resumed massaging her breasts and stroking her nipples with his thumbs. He was crouched over her, his strong thighs spread, his crotch suspended less than an inch above her lower belly and sex. As he resumed caressing her breasts, she felt his cock come into contact with her skin as the weight of his erection mounted. She moaned, the elusive touch of his desire tormenting her. “I came for you,” she confirmed in a heated rush. “I came because I need you.”
“Even if you don’t trust me?” he asked in a hard, dry tone, still molding her breasts to his hands and teasing her nipples with his fingertips.
Heat swept through her chest and face. “Isn’t it enough? That I’m here? That I let you tie me to this bed. That I’d let you do anything to me here?” she asked desperately.
His magical hands slowed. Holding her stare, he lifted his hand and pushed his blunt fingertips against her flushed lips.
“Anything?”
“Anything,” she whispered, arousal swelling in her.
“And you say you don’t trust,” he said so quietly, for a moment Alice thought she hadn’t heard him correctly.
His head lowered again, and her thoughts splintered as he kissed her breasts and ribs and heaving belly, pausing to taste her with the tip of his tongue or bite gently at the curve of her hip. Her skin roughened. She pulled on her restraints, squirming on the bed, but the straps remained secure—holding her in place for pleasure.
Making it impossible to
run. She loved him for knowing she required that. Especially tonight.
There was no teasing or build-up to ecstasy—or at least very little of it, anyway. One second, Dylan was feathering his tongue across her hipbone, and the next, he was dipping it between her labia and laving her clit hard. Alice’s body tightened and jerked. Her shout of surprise segued to a moan. The pleasure was hot, flooding, and intense. She twisted her hips, not wanting to escape necessarily, but instinctively flinching from such an onrush of sensation.
Dylan captured her hips and held her down on the bed, demanding a steady target. He turned his head to find a new angle with which to torture her with the firm mastery of his tongue. She lifted her head from the pillows, watching him. He lashed and agitated her clit, his actions bold and lewd one moment, gentle and soothing the next. His mouth applied the most concise, yet subtle suction. Her entire body seized in pleasure. It felt like he filled her with it, every movement, every second that passed, mounting the unbearable friction
Finally, she broke and shuddered in his hold.
Even as she struggled to recover from her orgasm, she felt him slide a finger into her slit. She clamped him without thought, still in the clutches of her climax.
“That’s right. I can feel you coming for me.”
Alice opened her eyes to find him staring at her face. His eyes shone with lust. His sensual, firm lips, chin, and nose glistened from her juices. She whimpered at the sight of him, another shudder of pleasure rippling through her. He stroked her higher with his finger, his mouth slanting with arousal. He had lowered over her, and now knelt between her spread thighs. She suddenly felt a pressure behind her knee. He rolled her hips back, urging her to bend her knees, her feet hanging in the air. At the new angle, he plunged his finger into her more firmly. She whimpered at the sound of him moving in her aroused sex. He growled roughly.
“You hear that, don’t you? You’re soaking wet.” He leaned down again between her spread thighs and kissed the damp hair above her clit, the slight pressure and the promise of more flooding pleasure making her moan and pull on her restraints. He continued to stroke her deep with his finger.
