The Dream Stalker (Gifted Liaisons)

by Capri Montgomery

  She felt Warren’s hand press against the back of her head, slowly massaging and rubbing, comforting her. Every impulse made her want to push him away, fight him for hurting her, but instead she turned into him, buried herself against him and sobbed relentlessly.

  “I’m so sorry,” he whispered. “I’ll make it right,” he said. She didn’t know what “it” he was talking about. All she knew was she was scared, not only for her life, but for them. She clung to him all night. He had pulled her into his arms as he reclined. He had promised to hold her and they could sleep, but she couldn’t sleep. He had fallen asleep, but she had laid there awake all night. She wouldn’t sleep, not tonight.

  By the time she woke the sun was just getting ready to crest the sky. Any other time she would love to go out and see the sun hitting the rock formations that were now covered with snow. Right now she didn’t want to do much of anything. A hot shower, maybe breakfast, but she was sure there wasn’t any food in the place. Not to mention the fact she didn’t have warm clothes to put on. He brought her suitcase, she saw him carry it inside, but she hadn’t exactly packed for winter. Down in the valley the nights were cold, but the days were rather warm. She didn’t need more than a sweater so she hadn’t packed anything more. Up here she needed snow boots, a winter coat, hat, scarf, the whole shebang.

  “Are you hungry?”

  “Considering I didn’t eat yesterday and I haven’t had breakfast…yeah, I could eat.” She shrugged as she opened her suitcase. She pulled out a pair of dark blue jeans that fit her curves expertly, a red knitted sweater top and her four inch stiletto white boots. The boots were designed for show and moderate comfort, but not for rain and certainly not snow. Her feat would be soaking wet within minutes if she wore them outside. Still, the hardwood floors weren’t exactly warm and toasty, despite the warmer temperatures in the cabin, and she didn’t want her feet to be cold all weekend. She just needed to make it a couple days and they’d both have to be back to the valley in time for work.

  “There’s a general store about five miles out. Later, I’ll go pick up some food for the weekend…or longer,” he winked.

  She reserved her initial shock. Longer? He was planning on staying longer? “Why don’t you take me with you?”

  “Please,” he chuckled. “You’ll probably tell them I’m holding you against your will. My attorney isn’t exactly on friendly terms with me so I’d probably spend the night in jail.”

  “Would serve you right,” she snorted. “Warren,” her voice turned deadly serious. “Will it be okay if I sleep during the day? I mean he wouldn’t know I’m sleeping.”

  “He’ll probably expect you to sleep during the day. You didn’t sleep last night.”

  “I—”

  He held up his hand. “You held yourself so rigid against me all night, trust me, I know you didn’t sleep. You don’t trust me to save you. Right now I can’t blame you for that.”

  “I’m just so tired,” she said. The argument and fighting had taken a lot out of her, but so had each of the dreams. It was as if every time he walked her dream he fed off her energy, grew stronger because of her. She knew it was crazy-stupid to think like that. It wasn’t possible, but then again, to the rest of the world neither was dream walking.

  “You do need to sleep. Try a little while I’m here, but not while I’m gone.”

  She nodded her understanding. She didn’t think it would matter much whether Warren was there or not. The dream stalker, as he’d called him, seemed to have a firm grip on controlling her. She couldn’t even run, and this last time, in her dream, her voice had barely risen past a whisper. She imagined he was trying to prevent her from alerting anybody else to her distress. He didn’t want to be disturbed…but something had stopped him. Something had allowed her to wake up. What was it? It couldn’t have been the dream catchers because he had assured her they wouldn’t stop him. Unless he was lying to her. No, she didn’t think that was it at all. When he started to approach her he was too sure of himself to be lying about it.

  “Warren?”

  “Yes?”

  “This last time…something stopped him. Something let me wake up.”

  “Dream catchers are supposed to help…”

  She shook her head. “No, he was sure they wouldn’t stop him. Something else stopped him and let me wake up and I really wish I knew what it was. I really wish I could thank whoever it was.” She wondered if just having Warren in bed with her, sleeping at the same time, surrounded by the dream catchers, if maybe that had something to do with it.

  He pulled her into his arms and brushed a soft kiss against her lips. She should have resisted, pulled away, but some need inside of her allowed him to kiss her again. Before she knew what was happening she was returning his kiss, allowing his tongue to mingle with hers, his hands to explore her body. The moans escaping her lips were those of desire and longing and need…she needed this. She needed his touch, his caress, but it wouldn’t solve their problems. She couldn’t get lost in the moment when she knew after they’d still have the same issues, he still would not trust her.

  She started to pull away, but his arms pulled her in tighter and this time she didn’t resist. He slid his hand down her waist, pushed aside the housecoat and quickly slipped his hands under her sleep shirt. She moaned with pleasure, knowing exactly where that hand was journeying.

  Within seconds his fingers were caressing her folds, parting them gently and rubbing her clit. “Oh,” she moaned against his mouth. She pulled closer to him, needing him, needing his touch. It had been so long, too long.

  His lips left hers and begin sucking on her neck, her collarbone, her shoulder, as his fingers slipped inside her. “You’re so warm and wet, love. I want to be here.” He nipped her neck with his teeth. “I need to be here.”

  And she needed him there too. “Please,” she moaned. “Please don’t,” the words escaped her lips. His hand was slow to leave her panties, but it left. He pulled back and looked in her eyes. The desire was there, the lust and want, but not the trust.

  “I want you so bad it hurts inside, Warren. But sex isn’t going to solve what’s wrong with us.”

  “Is it that? Or is that when you file your papers you want to be sure you can tell the judge it’s been weeks since we’ve had sex?”

  She laughed huskily. “Is that what you’re worried about; the reason I put on the papers? Don’t. I’ll take full blame. Call it irreconcilable differences.” She pulled away; he pulled her close.

  “I don’t want those differences between us.”

  “They’re already there, Warren.”

  “Won’t you try? I’ll do therapy, church, whatever it takes.”

  She shook her head. “I’m not sure therapy will help. And church…you’re on your own there.” She pulled away from him again.

  “But if therapy will help; will you try it?”

  She picked up her clothes, and started to walk away. She looked back over her shoulder and said, “I don’t know that we can fix this. I don’t know if I want to.”

  Chapter Six

  The entire time Warren drove out to the general store to get food Daya’s words kept punching him in the gut. She didn’t know if she even wanted to try to fix things. Maybe he deserved those words, but that didn’t make it hurt any less. He was so pissed by the time he reached the store that he bought enough food for two weeks. He wasn’t planning to stay that long. He had a case to see to, no vacation time to take right now because he was in the middle of a case and this wasn’t just a run of the mill case. The media was involved and once that happened the mayor jumped on the “solve it now” band wagon. Not to mention that Daya had work too. Somebody would surely miss them at some point.

  He placed a quick call to his partner from the payphone outside the store. “I need a few days,” he had said. He didn’t need to elaborate. They were partners; he knew his meaning was understood.

  “I’ll cover for you.”

  A quick “thanks,” w
as all he uttered before leaving the general store and driving back up to the cabin. He put the bags of food on the kitchen counter and went in search of Daya. She hadn’t answered when he called so that may have meant she took her chances with the snow.

  What he found when he reached the bedroom made his blood boil with fear. He placed his hand on her leg and she bolted upright.

  “Jeeze, you scared me.”

  “You weren’t supposed to fall asleep.”

  “I was sleepy,” she retorted. “He didn’t come back.”

  “He could have.” He took her hand and pulled her up into his arms. “He could have.”

  “Did you get food?” She pulled away.

  “In the kitchen.”

  She walked past him and into the kitchen, stopping when she saw the rows of bags on the countertop.

  “Um…Warren. That’s a lot of food for two days.”

  He shrugged. “Or longer,” he said as if those words didn’t matter.

  “You have work. I have work. You can’t just drag me off into the wild and expect me to…” she placed her hands on her hips. “What? Why are you laughing?”

  “The wild? Daya, this isn’t the wild.”

  “Whatever,” she stipulated. “The point is—”

  “The point is I’m not leaving here until I know we’re going to at least try to work on our marriage. When you tell me that then we’ll go.”

  “Fine, we’ll work on our marriage,” she plastered on a fake smile.

  “When you tell me that and mean it.”

  “That wasn’t in the deal.”

  “It is now.” He put away the food, piece by piece. Cans went in the cabinet, fruits and vegetables went to the refrigerator along with the juice he’d bought. “And, for a peace offering I got you this,” he pulled out marshmallows and hot chocolate.

  “I can’t have hot chocolate and you know it. The caffeine.”

  “I forgot,” he shook his head. “I never think about this stuff having caffeine.”

  “It’s okay. The marshmallows should be good by themselves.”

  “Daya…”

  “Yeah,” she put the bag of marshmallows in the cabinet.

  He placed his hands on her upper arms and turned her to face him. “Please don’t leave me?”

  “You hurt me, Warren. It wasn’t just that you spent weeks—months even, acting weird toward me, it’s that you didn’t trust me. You didn’t trust me not to hurt you…to ever hurt you like that.”

  “I trusted…” he stopped noting she didn’t buy the trust declaration. “I don’t know why I just started having these feelings that you and the judge…that he was going to get you back. That he was the better man and he’d win you back.”

  “Warren,” she placed her hand on his cheek. “If I wanted Alex I’d be with him. He’s a friend, you’re my husband, the man I love and I want you. You’re the better man, the best man, for me.”

  “Then why don’t I feel as if I’m enough?”

  She shrugged. “You have issues.”

  He laughed a little. “I guess I do.”

  “I know you do. You work harder than any man in your department trying to prove yourself. You spend less time talking about your heritage, which your heritage rocks by the way, and more time worrying what the “guys” think. If you’d cut yourself a break you’d realize you’re just as good of a man, if not better, than those same people you’re trying so desperately to impress.”

  He shook his head. “God, why didn’t you say that to me months ago?”

  “You weren’t a total jerk months ago.”

  “Just a jerk now? Now that’s progress,” he smiled. “You’re right. I feel inadequate. I’m not the best Indian I can be, and I don’t feel as if the guys really think of me as one of them.”

  “Because you’re Indian? Please. Those guys appreciate you, and if any of them don’t, simply because of your ethnicity, then they’re the ones with the problem.”

  “What about you?”

  “I’ve already told you, Warren. You’re the best man for me. The Warren I married anyway. This new version, the less confident, blind as a bat and dumb as a doorknob version, isn’t working for me.”

  “Dumb as a doorknob?” He resisted the urge to laugh again. She certainly wasn’t holding back.

  She nodded. “You’re wonderful. You used to see that. What happened?”

  “I married you.” He saw the look of shock on her face. Already she thought something opposite of what he was saying and he knew he needed to clear it up. “I married you and my fears intensified. I was afraid I wouldn’t be enough…that I wouldn’t be the man you deserved.”

  “Do you think you’re the only one with fears? I was worried I wouldn’t be a good wife. I’ve been independent, in control, solo for so long that I thought sharing my life with you would be hard to do. But you, you showed me sharing my life with you wasn’t about give and take, it was about love and trust and holding on to each other.”

  “Can we still hold on to each other, Daya. Can we stay married?”

  He pleaded in his tone, with his eyes, with his hands caressing her arms. He needed her to hear his plea. Needed her to say yes.

  “We start talking. Whatever is bothering you or me we talk about it. No more holding it in until we explode at each other.”

  “Deal,” he nodded.

  “And we get one thing straight.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You ever accuse me of having an affair again I’m going to deck you.”

  He laughed hard. “God knows I’d deserve it.”

  She pulled him into her arms and hugged him. “Cook breakfast,” she whispered. “I need food.”

  “I can do that.”

  “Oh I know. I cooked dinner. Whether you ate it or not isn’t the point…wait, did you turn the oven off?”

  “Yeah, I got it before we left.”

  “You mean before you took me prisoner.”

  He laughed again, pulling her closer to his body. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. I just took my wife on a weekender.”

  She laughed. “Like hell you did.” She kissed his cheek softly, leaned in so that her lips were mere centimeters from his ear and whispered. “It was kind of sexy actually…the Warren I married came back and it was a complete turn on.”

  “Then maybe we should do something about that.” He slid his hand down her back to her butt and gave a light squeeze.

  “I’m starving,” she admitted. “After?”

  “After,” he agreed.

  Just knowing she wasn’t going to go down to the courthouse the moment they got back to the Valley and file papers was enough to help him breathe a little easier. He still had a lot to make up for. The things he had said to her, the things he hadn’t done, all of it needed to be fixed. He was willing to work to make up for the crap he’d thrown at her. She was, fortunately, willing to let him try to make up for it.

  After breakfast his mind was back on business. That business was saving Daya from this dream stalker, this monster who had set his sights on his woman. Warren knew he wouldn’t stop, not until he’d taken what he wanted…not until he’d killed Daya. He wasn’t about to let that happen.

  “Tell me what you saw this last time, in your dream.”

  “Warren,” she straddled his lap. “We haven’t had sex in a really long time. Are you sure talking is really what you’d rather be doing right now?”

  No, he was sure talking wasn’t what he wanted to be doing. Talking was what they needed to do right now. But the more she rocked against his growing erection, the more he felt the warmth of her sex pressing against his pants, the more talking seemed like a phenomenally bad idea.

  He slid his hand up her waist, around her belly and then up to her breast. Caressing and squeezing, touching, wanting to taste her. His hand pressed harder. Her cries became louder as she rocked against him. She was ready, damn near climax and if he didn’t get inside her soon she was going to come wit
hout him. Normally he’d just set his mind to making her come again, but given the distance that had been between them he needed this connection. He needed to feel her climax, not just watch it happen.

  The kitchen chair wasn’t exactly what he had in mind for “makeup sex” but he’d take it.

  He put just enough space between her body and his to remove her jeans. He unzipped his pants, slipped his hand inside his boxer briefs and released his hardened dick before pulling her back closer to him.

  “Oh, God. Oh, Warren please now.”

  Her plea sent a primal need racing through his body. He needed to be inside her, needed to feel her take him in deep and hold him there. God, he could remember just how tight she held him, just how hard her muscles clenched around him, and he wanted that now.

  He tore her panties from her body, lifted her and pulled her down on his erection; that hard, that fast. The sudden action caused her to scream as her head fell back.

  He needed more of her, wanted more of her. He let her ride him, let her take control as he gathered her sweater in his hands and lifted it just above her breasts.

  Her nipples were hard, her skin warm to the touch. He wanted to suck on her breast and so he did. His mouth sucked, his tongue teased. He alternated between soft, subtle coercive motions and hard, needing, demanding sucking as she rode him.