by Alicia Scott
"Please," she whimpered, "please."
He raised his head. Dimly he was aware of moisture staining his cheeks but he wasn't sure how it had gotten there. His hand moved down her body, his fingers splaying across her gently sloping belly, then curving down to the warm apex of her thighs. Her hair felt soft and coaxing. Her legs parted for him immediately, and she arched against his palm.
He cupped her. He moved his hand in stirring little circles, his dark gaze watching the sweat bead her upper lip. Her eyes were closed, her red-blond lashes glimmering like gold upon her flushed cheeks. Her neck had arched back and she had surrendered herself to his touch completely, with a fresh, guileless greed that squeezed his chest.
Her knees came up, her thighs spreading even farther, letting him in even deeper. He dipped in one finger, then two, feeling her unbelievably moist core. She contracted around him and it was too much.
He was a man, only a man and it had been so long… He wanted her legs around his waist. He wanted himself impaled in her, moving in her, dying in her.
Too much sentiment. Not enough logic. What had happened to his control? To hell with it all.
He swept his body over hers, his mouth closing upon her lips, suckling her tongue. Her arms swept around his shoulders, her legs settled around his waist and he was lost.
One smooth thrust and he rent her asunder.
She stiffened immediately, her body suddenly rigid, her nails sinking into his back. She was tight, too tight.
"Relax," he whispered tightly and stroked her hip. "Relax, sweetheart. Trust me."
He heard her breath released as a sigh. Her body sank around him, becoming supple and pliable. He stroked her hip again and then again until he felt the last of the tension leave her and the pain washed from her face to be filled with slow wonder.
"Yes," he murmured. "Like that."
He moved slowly, gritting his teeth with the effort, fighting his own impulses and desperate, maniacal need. She was so tight and so moist. Hot and burning and she was killing him, absolutely killing him, and he was defenseless against it.
His eyes closed. He couldn't bear to look at her anymore, he couldn't bear to think. "You give me too much," he whispered and sank into her as deep as he could go.
She sighed his name and urged him deeper.
His hips rolled, small rocking motions that slowly built the tempo. Her breathing increased its pace and he heard her first gasp as the pleasure overrode reason. He arched his hips back and her legs tightened around him instinctively and thrust him back into her body.
His neck corded. His teeth bared and his biceps bulged and suddenly the pace was out of his control. It was fast and urgent and he wanted the release so badly that for a suspended beat of time, he couldn't find it. It was too much, too grand, too brilliant, too overwhelming for one man to take. It would shatter him and he hated being shattered. It would stand out forever in his mind and he resented the binds that memory forged.
None of that mattered. Maggie cried out his name, then screamed her release and he did shatter. Into a million sharp, glittering shards, his body combusted. His head fell forward. His hips collapsed into hers and he buried his lips against her throat and shuddered and shuddered and shuddered against her body.
He whispered her name. She held him even tighter and everything was all right.
Chapter 12
« ^ »
Seven-fifteen a.m.
The battered blue '79 pickup truck rumbled along the road, the fan belt held on by baling twine but the tires brand-new and bought just for this trip. It was a Chevrolet, of course—you should always buy American. On the left of the rear bumper a sticker proclaimed, My definition of gun control is hitting the target with every shot. On the right a second sticker emphasized, You can have my gun when you pry it out of my cold, dead hand.
Since Abraham Cannon had always believed talk was cheap, he backed up both stickers with a gun rack sporting two rifles in the cab of his truck. The gun rack was also new; he'd carved it with his own two hands from an oak that had been hit by lightning. The grain of the wood was fine and well polished. He'd already taken offers to build several more racks for others, which didn't surprise him. He was good with his hands and he took his work seriously. In this day and age, a man had to be prepared.
Abraham was prepared now. He wore his orange hunter's vest over a khaki T-shirt and desert camouflage pants. His utility belt held an army knife, compass, waterproof matches and rudimentary first-aid kit complete with needle and thread should a man have to stitch up a wound—which he'd done twice, as one scar on his lower left calf and one scar across his chin proved. Above the stiff leather of his steel-toed combat boots he'd strapped his hunting knife.
In addition to the two rifles sitting in his gun rack, he carried a sawed-off shotgun beneath his seat and a crossbow on the seat beside him. The crossbow was his weapon of choice and he was one of the best shots in Idaho. He'd the eyes of an eagle and steady hands guided by God himself.
Abraham was not a person who harbored doubts.
Now he listened to the police scanner on his CB with half his attention, while the other half minded the road. Cool morning, damp morning, but the sun was coming out now and the water steaming off the pavement in a beautiful, misty display. It was too brown here, a little too stark for a man who loved mountains. But the red hills carried their own beauty and it was all God's land.
The scanner crackled to life.
Heading westbound on I-26, Abraham paused on the lonely highway and listened with full attention. His face didn't change. His lips never moved.
Finally, after two minutes of listening, he simply nodded to himself.
Seven-eighteen a.m.
He picked up the pace. He'd catch 395 south to I-20 and head to Bend. He didn't think he'd have to get that far. No doubt, he'd meet Cain somewhere in between.
A man had to do what a man had to do.
Especially in war.
"It's time to move."
Cain spoke softly, but his voice was firm. Lying beside him, Maggie nodded against the white pillow but didn't meet his gaze. Instead, she was staring at his hand with rapt attention. She'd splayed his fingers, turning his hand palm up. Now she pressed her own hand against him, her pale skin stunning against his dark complexion, her delicate fingers emphasized by his long, strong digits and thick ridges of yellow calluses. His hand dwarfed hers. It looked as if his grip should crush the fine structure of her bones or snap her wrist. But he wouldn't do something like that, which they both knew.
He wanted to touch her hair. He wanted to draw down her head and kiss her full, swollen lips once more. He wanted to feel her pulse begin to pound at the base of her graceful throat and listen to her sigh his name.
His gaze returned to her hand, so tiny and delicate and entwined so trustingly in his own. His chest tightened. His throat thickened.
And he felt it all over again, that primal urge to roll her onto her back, to slide into her body and make her his. It was crazy, but he wanted her as powerfully as a man could want a woman. He wanted her to be his in every blatantly chauvinistic sense of the word. He would walk down the streets with his arm around her shoulders so the world would know she was his girl. He would buy her dinner so he could watch the wine redden her cheeks and the food bring delight to her eyes. He would build her a home, give her anything she desired. He would protect her with his body and give his last breath to keep her from harm.
He would give her every part of him, body, heart and soul.
If he had been in the position to give her such things at all.
He repeated quietly, "It's time to move."
She looked up at last. "I love your body," she said simply.
He rolled out of the bed, his body already hard and his hands in fists at his sides. If he'd thought he was strong before, he realized now how weak he could be. And he wasn't a man who could afford weaknesses.
He stole a glance at the bedside clock. Big red numbers gl
owed 7:22 a.m. They were still nearly 150 miles from Idaho, with no immediate means of transportation. While Maggie's shopping venture had saved them prep time, they'd also stayed in bed twenty-two minutes longer than scheduled. They needed to get moving.
Once they were in Idaho, he could let Maggie go. She would be safe from Ham. Cain would return to the mountains he knew better than his own hands, and he would be safe for a bit, too. In the open, he was vulnerable. In the mountains, there was nothing he couldn't do.
"We leave in fifteen minutes," he said, not looking at her because the image of her lounging on the bed wearing only her tangled red hair was too potent. He picked up his mud-encrusted jeans.
Behind him, he heard the rustle of her finally sitting up on the bed.
"Do you want to have children?" she asked curiously.
His hand immediately froze with his jeans pulled halfway up. "Not today," he said at last, his voice surprisingly steady.
"I'd like to have four," she continued unperturbed, finally crawling out of bed and reaching for her underwear. "I used to think two, but really I would like to have four. One is too lonely. I hated being an only child. I wanted Stephanie to have other children, but she said she'd already sacrificed enough of her figure to have me. I thought I would be alone forever, then one day Maxmillian was gone, and Stephanie was telling me I had two brothers. Actually, she always refers to them as my half brothers. But how can you be half a brother? Are you the right half or the left half? The top half or the bottom half? They're just my brothers, and I'm their sister. I also have three step-siblings from Stephanie's later marriages, but they're still young children. I'm never sure what to call them. I mean the marriage made them my step-siblings, so does the divorce make them strangers? Or once you are a step-sibling are you always a step-sibling?"
"I don't know," Cain said slowly. He finished pulling on his jeans.
"I've never figured it out myself," Maggie confessed. From the corner of his eye, Cain saw her reach into one of her shopping bags and pull out two T-shirts. The larger of them she tossed to him, the other she yanked down over her head. It was ridiculously large on her petite frame, falling to the edge of her skirt. But even then, she still looked appealing.
Her hands went to work braiding her long hair. "When I was ten," she said conversationally as he belatedly returned to dressing himself, "I used to try and keep track of everyone. Stephanie had married Crandall then, and he had a baby girl from his first marriage named Charise. I got to hold her one weekend when her mother brought her. She was so beautiful and so adorable. I told Brandon and C.J. all about her, and they agreed we'd let her into our little group and when she was old enough she'd spend her summers on the farm as well. But next winter, Crandall had been kicked out and Charise was just gone. She and her mother lived in France and there was no reason for her mother to arrange for me to see her baby daughter. I sent gifts for a while on her birthday, but she never understood who I was and I didn't know how to explain it either. When Stephanie remarried the third time, I swore I'd be smarter but I wasn't. That man had twin boys, little five-year-old boys. Vincent and Brian. Cutest little kids. I'm not sure where they live now."
"It's not easy to keep track of people," Cain said. He finished tucking in the T-shirt, looking at her warily and wishing he could follow her train of thought. She didn't appear sad, just matter-of-fact. "Why does this come to mind now?"
"I just wanted to tell you."
He remained watching her silently. Her blue eyes finally swept up, peering at him through her shiny red hair.
"Family can be so confusing," she said quietly. "At least it is for me. So many stepparents, step-siblings, and half siblings passing through. It will never get easier, either. Marriage may not be forever, but divorce certainly is. One day I'll be a half aunt to children who will also have full aunts and maybe half aunts and full aunts on the other side of the family as well. That's a lot of aunts. Then there's the matter of grandparents. I have two sets, but my children would probably have three—four if my father was still alive. Three to four sets of grandmas and grandpas. On holidays, where do you go? Who do you visit?
"It's very complicated, you see. When I was little I got very anxious about it. I used to hold tea parties with my stuffed animals, each one named after one of my brothers or sisters who had moved away. And then I would cry because I thought that's the only contact I would ever have with all these children—stuffed animals bearing their names. But Lydia told me family was family and everything could be figured out. I want to figure it out, Cain. I want to get married someday even if my parents' marriages never worked out. I want to have children and give them a home and traditions like Lydia gave me. I want to unite all my step-siblings and introduce them to my half brothers. And maybe I'll start a tradition of Christmas week, and every two days will be spent with a new set of grandparents so everyone can see everyone because that's what the holidays are all about. And I'll get C.J. and Brandon to do it too, even if they grumble and pretend they're too tough for holidays.
"I want to do all these things. And I thought you should know about them because someday, I want to do them with you."
His body went very still. He thought he should say something but his mind remained perfectly blank. He could not think, he could not move. He just stood there in the middle of the room.
And he thought she was the most beautiful person he'd ever known. So many reasons to be bitter, yet there wasn't a bitter bone in her body. So many reasons to be tough and cynical, yet she remained warm and generous and determined to save everyone. She tried so hard and the world was running out of people who were willing to try.
"Cain?" she whispered after a moment, sounding vulnerable.
He forced himself to focus. "I … I hope someday you do all that you dream of, Maggie," he said at last. His voice was hoarse, so he cleared it and tried again. "But I don't think it will be with me," he finished quietly.
Her blue eyes grew luminescent. "You don't care about me?"
He opened his mouth to agree but found he couldn't look into those eyes and lie. "I have nothing to give you," he amended at last.
"I don't remember asking for anything."
"Love isn't free," he said levelly. "You of all people should know that. It requires commitment, time, care. I'm running from the law. I could be running a long time. I may never get free. I won't bind you to that, Maggie. That wouldn't be love."
She stared at him a suspended moment. "No," she agreed at last. "But the fact that you don't want to bind me to your problems—that's love."
He didn't deny it. He didn't agree with it. He just looked at her and she looked back at him, and it was simply there between them, something thick, nearly tangible, but too fragile for words.
He thought, Please, oh please, don't let Ham figure out what she means to me.
Cain picked up her locket where it lay in a gold puddle on the floor. He placed it in her palm and wrapped her fingers around it. "You should keep it. Now gather your things. We need to leave."
"Good enough," she whispered, then added, "For now."
He didn't say anything. Instead he thought of the prison bars and the way they sounded as they closed, kchink, kchink.
The sound of regret, he thought now. The sound of someone who had made one too many mistakes.
Maggie looked over her shoulder once, then twice. There was still no one in sight.
"Okay," she whispered, though her tone still held a faint edge of mutiny. "Now."
One sharp downward blow and Cain popped open the ignition of stolen vehicle number three. He moved fast and quick beneath the canvas top of the Jeep, but Maggie was no longer impressed.
She'd wanted to buy an old junk car rather than steal another vehicle from some poor, innocent person. Cain, however, had pointed out that you generally needed ID to purchase automobiles, plus you had to fill out paperwork. All of that could be used to track them down.
So could a stolen vehicle, she'd countered.
So they were on the road again, this time in a Jeep.
Cain relaxed visibly once they were back on highway 20. It was just after eight and there wasn't much traffic. No sign of cops, no sign of pursuers. The pavement was still wet but drying fast beneath the warm embrace of a bright spring sun.
Maggie studied Cain for a while beneath the cover of her lashes. And then, because she couldn't help herself, she reached over, touched his cheek and smiled.
"You're ridiculously happy for a hostage." His lips were curving as well.
"Must be the company I'm keeping."
He grinned at her, and for a moment everything was all right.
She put back the top, letting in the cool spring air and scent of rain. The wind tangled through her braid. The sun caught her hair and lit it on fire. She leaned back against the seat, closing her eyes and tilting up her cheeks to the clear blue sky.
Big fluffy clouds looked like wads of fresh cotton. The distant tops of verdant mountains offered a beckoning horizon. Everything smelled spicy, fresh and green.
She thought it was a beautiful day.
Cain spotted the cop car first. It wasn't behind them. Actually, it was heading right toward them, barreling westbound in one hell of a hurry. Automatically Cain's grip tightened on the wheel.
"Remain calm," he muttered. Maggie wasn't sure if he was speaking to himself or to her. They were just coming up on signs for 395 north, and they were the only vehicle on the road.
She sat a little straighter, watching the police car take shape. As it grew on the horizon, dust and waves of heat shimmered behind it.
"Do you think he'll recognize us?" she whispered.
Cain glanced at her, then at the canvas top she'd pulled back. "Your hair," he said simply.
