Because We Belong: A Because You Are Mine Novel

by Kery, Beth

  “I didn’t steal anything!” Francesca jumped at the harsh male shout. “He left it to me. Left me that house you say belongs to you, too, only I didn’t have the tax money and they took it from me,” a deep, rough voice rang out from the shadows at the far end of the room. Francesca started at the vision of a tall, broad-shouldered figure coming at them with alarming speed. He was carrying a shotgun. Ian moved in front of Francesca, so that she had to look around his arm to see. She heard the innocuous, cheerful sound of eager paws and tinkling metal. She glanced down in amazement when a beautiful, well-groomed golden retriever approached her and Ian’s legs and sniffed at them with friendly interest. There was a small, sophisticated-looking electronic device strapped on the dog’s right leg. It looked, oddly enough, like a very expensive watch.

  “Get back Angus,” the man bellowed, startling Francesca. Kam Reardon’s face was twisted in a fury. He paused when he noticed her peering around Ian, his frown fading. His light gray eyes ran over her face. Ian seemed to sense him studying her, because he put his hand back on her hip and pushed, urging her farther behind him.

  Kam Reardon had Lucien’s eyes. She leaned out again, her curiosity trumping her fear.

  The man’s frightening scowled returned. “Get the hell out of here,” he growled.

  “I’m sorry for trespassing,” Ian said levelly. “We don’t mean any harm, Kam. I came to talk to you. So did Lucien, here,” he said, nodding at Lucien, who looked very wary eyeing Kam’s pointed shotgun. “Lucien is our . . . brother as well,” Ian said, seeming to hesitate at saying the word.

  “And her?” Gaines said, nodding in the direction behind Ian. “Is she one of us?”

  “No,” Ian said harshly. Kam’s gaze lowered to where Ian palmed the side of her hip.

  “I said to get the hell out,” Kam yelled suddenly, white teeth flashing in his dark beard. He cocked the gun.

  “Go on,” Ian said tersely, turning and pushing Francesca in front of him. Lucien followed. Ian handed her the flashlight. “Lead the way. Hurry,” he ordered.

  Francesca jogged down the dark tunnel, her heart pounding in her chest, highly aware that it wasn’t just Lucien and Ian who were behind her. Kam Reardon was bringing up the rear. She could hear his footsteps grinding in the stony dirt, but imagined she could feel his simmering anger behind them as he followed, assuring himself they well and truly left his underground territory. The dog Angus frolicked next to them, an unlikely escort to such a tense eviction.

  * * *

  After they returned to the manor, Ian insisted upon searching for the suspected underground entrance where Reardon entered Aurore. Francesca went with them into the gloomy, musty basement that seemed to stretch forever in each direction. Ian and Lucien did, indeed, after much searching, discover a hidden door that led to a tunnel.

  “It looks like it was built fairly recently, at least in comparison to the house,” Lucien observed, running his hand over the wood timbers that enforced a different branch of the tunnel system than the one they’d been in earlier.

  “I’m thinking it might have been constructed during World War II, during the German occupation. There was fighting in this vicinity. The owners might have wanted an escape route or a hideout if troops ever tried to occupy. Look at this,” Ian said, running the flashlight along a plastic tube that contained multiple electrical wires. “Bloody bastard has me paying for his electricity,” Ian said, his tone a strange mixture of annoyance, amusement, and respect.

  Afterward, they all retired to the parlor. The fire was dying in the hearth, but still gave off sufficient heat to warm Francesca.

  “How old do you think he is?” Lucien asked after they’d talked a while about the idiosyncratic Reardon.

  “Hard to tell with that bloody beard and all the grime. Around our age, maybe younger,” Ian said. “He’s got a story to tell.”

  “He’s clearly more than a wild tramp,” Lucien said, standing and stretching. “He’s organized and methodical . . . and brilliant, if I don’t miss my guess.”

  “A chip off the old block,” Ian muttered.

  “Didn’t the townspeople give you any idea of his background?” Lucien asked.

  “I only got some of the newer residents to open up and talk,” Ian said, the low flames of the fire flickering in his eyes as he stared. “They all seemed to be of the belief that he’s a homeless, wild tramp.”

  “Why wouldn’t the people who have lived here for longer talk to you?” Francesca asked.

  She flinched inwardly when his gleaming eyes met hers. He’d hardly met her gaze at all since she’d arrived.

  “Because I spook them,” Ian said, his mouth slanting into a mirthless smile. “They think I’m Gaines’s ghost.” Her heart seemed to jump against her breastbone. She blinked when he stood abruptly from the couch.

  “I’m going to bed,” he said.

  Lucien gave her a half-apologetic, half-compassionate glance when Ian stalked out of the room without another word.

  * * *

  Lucien indicated which room Ian slept in before he bid her good night, and opened a door at the other end of the long hallway.

  She rapped on the designated door quietly before she entered, but Ian didn’t reply. He stood unmoving next to an ancient four-poster bed with a drooping canopy of dusty, faded crimson velvet. She gave him a questioning, worried look when he just stared at the bed without looking around at her.

  “I don’t know where to put you to sleep,” he said starkly, surprising her.

  “I don’t know what you mean,” she said slowly, confused. Was he going to insist she sleep separately from him? Was he still that angry that she’d come?

  “I mean I don’t know where to put you. There’s no place suitable,” he waved at the sagging mattress on the old relic. “The beds are all like this.”

  She gave a soft bark of laughter when she recognized the direction of his concern. “Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll be fine. I’ve been camping before. It can’t be much worse than . . .”

  She faded off when he turned to her and she saw the utter bleakness of his expression.

  “Ian,” she whispered, her throat going tight. She rushed to him, hugging him tight, her cheek pressed against his chest. “I don’t care where I sleep. I just want to be wherever you are. I just want to be with you, and know you’re okay.”

  For a wretched few seconds, he didn’t return her fervent embrace. Slowly, his arms encircled her waist. Then he was pulling her tight against him, his face pressing to the top of her head.

  “You smell so good,” he mumbled next to her hair. “If I kept my nose buried here, if I kept myself buried in you, I could forget this disgusting old house . . . all of it. You have no idea how much the idea appeals.”

  She whimpered softly, pressing her face closer to his solid heat. “I had to come. Please don’t be mad at me. I know I said I understood about you trying to figure things out for yourself, but I didn’t know . . .”

  “I meant this?” he asked, cradling the back of her head with his palm and urging her to look up at him.

  “I panicked when I thought of you being here,” she admitted in a rush. “It just seemed so . . . awful.”

  “It is awful,” he said dryly. “I told you it was. I told you I didn’t want you here. It pains me to see it, Francesca.”

  She looked up at him through a veil of tears. “It pains me. If it’s true that you think it will help you somehow, then tell me. Tell me how, Ian,” she implored. A tear skipped down her cheek. “Make me understand, because I’m trying so hard to be on your side.”

  “That’s just it,” he said, profound frustration entering his bold features. He opened his hand at the side of her head, thumbing the skin of her cheek. “You can’t understand this place. To you, it’s just a dirty, moldy pile. But to me, it holds answers. Look at tonight,” he added pointedly when she just loo
ked at him, bewildered. “Kam Reardon. He’ll be able to answer questions for me.”

  “If you can keep him from shooting you, first . . . maybe,” Francesca said doubtfully.

  “He’s not going to shoot me. At least I don’t think so. He apparently had the opportunity plenty of times before and never did,” he said, still stroking her cheek, his expression thoughtful.

  “That’s not all that reassuring,” she replied desperately.

  “I’m sorry. If I can’t explain it to you, then I don’t know what to do,” he said in a pressured tone. “I’m telling you there are answers here for me. About Trevor Gaines. About who he was. About how I got here on this earth.”

  “How is knowing all that going to make a difference to you?” she asked wildly.

  He clamped his eyes together, his expression so frustrated it made it her want to weep. “I’m telling you that it makes a difference to me because it does. I’m telling you that it does, what else can I say to convince you? If I can figure things out, make sense of it in my mind—”

  “But it’s mad,” she interrupted, growing frantic.

  He opened his eyes slowly, spearing her with his stare. His brow furrowed slightly. Francesca froze when she saw his dawning comprehension.

  “That’s what you think? That I’m going mad?”

  “I . . .” She shook her head, her mind spinning. Did she think he was losing his mental facilities? “No. No,” she repeated, realizing it was true. He was emotionally overwrought, but he wasn’t a madman. She met his stare, pleading for him to understand. “I’m just . . . scared. It terrified me, thinking of you digging around in that man’s possessions, trying to understand him.”

  Her shaky admission seemed to hover in the air between them.

  “I’m a little scared, too,” he admitted after a moment. “But not of the same thing you are. Not of going mad. Not anymore anyway.”

  “What then?” she whispered, pulling closer to his heat.

  “Of not being able to understand. If I can’t wrap my head around who my biological father was, I can’t . . .” He gritted his teeth and winced. “I can’t get the poison of him out of me. I don’t know how else to put it. If you’d just let me, I can do this, Francesca. I believe it now, more than ever. With Lucien here, with all the research I’ve already compiled, even catching a glimpse of Kam Reardon’s life tonight, I’m starting to get a hold on who Trevor Gaines was.” His eyes looked a little wild as he clutched tighter at her head. “If I can’t do this, I can’t feel right about being with you forever. I don’t want to taint you—”

  “You would never do that!”

  “Damn it, Francesca,” he shouted harshly. “This is my worry. This is my burden, and I’m trying to make it go away. I’m not doing this to be stubborn, or because I’m going mad. I’m not doing this because I want to alienate you! I’m doing this because I have to if I want to be with you. And that’s all . . . I want . . . in the world,” he grated succinctly out between white, clenched teeth.

  She just stared at him, her heart pounding, unable to draw breath.

  “Ian,” she exhaled, a convulsion of emotion going through her. “Ian, I’m so sorry.”

  “Don’t be. The last thing you should be doing is apologizing,” he whispered harshly, grimacing, absorbing her shudders. “It pains me to see you in this place, but . . .” He shook his head and swallowed, loosening his hold on her and caressing her temple. “It strangely helps, too, I think. I don’t know. It’s strange. Tonight, I feel like it really is possible to maybe wrap my head around this whole nightmare. And I really don’t think it’s just because of Lucien being here, or discovering what an . . . interesting person Kam Reardon really is.”

  “I don’t want you to feel alone,” she said. “If I’ve made you feel that way, because you knew I wouldn’t accept any of this, I’m sorry. That was selfish of me. I thought you were the one being selfish with all this, but I was wrong.”

  He leaned down, tilting her face up. He kissed her hard. Gentle. She didn’t know which, and never did when it came to Ian. She felt his body stir and pressed closer, desirous of his heat and hardness.

  “You are the most generous woman I know,” he said against her lips a moment later. “The last thing you’re being is selfish.”

  “You always think this poison you speak of is going to taint me, Ian,” she murmured breathily. “But love is the strongest antidote to your fears . . . and yes . . . even against this supposed taint.” She combed her fingers through his thick, short hair, scraping his scalp. He closed his eyes and groaned. “Let me make love to you here. Right here. In the middle of all your darkness,” she said emphatically as she began to kiss his jaw, tenderly abrading her lips with his whiskers. She kissed his leaping pulse and he started.

  “No,” he said harshly, running his hands along her arms and captured her wrists. He held her and stepped away. His eyes shone with barely restrained emotion. “But you came, and I can’t change that. And now that you’re here, I have to have you. I suffered too much in this very room, your absence like a gaping hole inside me. I can’t turn you away now. So I will make love to you. And then we’ll both know if what you say is true, or if I am just using you to chase away the shadows.”

  He transferred her wrists to the small of her back and held them there with one hand. He bent down, forcing her back to arch, and began to devour her.

  * * *

  He became even more quickly intoxicated by her taste tonight, as greedy as he was for it. How he wanted to believe what she said was true, that her sweetness wasn’t just a temporary escape from all this darkness, but a true home.

  His rightful place.

  He used his free hand to touch her, relishing restraining her supple body in the taut arch, knowing she was his to do with as he pleased, all because it was her pleasure as well. She was a decadence he couldn’t believe he deserved, but he must, because her eagerness was inescapable. His cock swelled at the sensation of the taut lines of her back and ribs, the delicious round, firmness of her breasts beneath the fitted button-down shirt. He filled his hand with her, absorbed her soft moan into his mouth, felt her heat begin to resonate from her sex against his belly. His cock reared almost furiously.

  He hissed and broke their kiss, releasing his hold on her wrists. Taking a step back with a goal in mind, he paused abruptly at the vision she made. Her lips were dark pink, damp and parted, her cheeks flushed. Her dark gold, red-tinted hair fell in loose waves down her back and arms. Her dark eyes shone with lust and love, her gaze like a steamy blessing.

  He strode rapidly to the edge of the room, where there was a wooden bench. Ian thought it once might have served the purpose of being a location for placing shoes and slippers, but the lowness of the seat was what he wanted for his purpose. He lifted it and rapidly carried it to where Francesca stood, watching him silently. He set it down, his gaze once again glued to her luminous face and pink, lush lips.

  She really was here.

  “Sit,” he rasped. The bench was much lower than a normal chair, so when she sat she was at kneeling level.

  “I don’t like to think of you kneeling on that disgusting carpet,” he muttered, holding her stare as he fleetly unfastened his button fly. Her nostrils flared slightly as her gaze lowered over his abdomen to his crotch. He grimaced as he pulled his heavy erection free of his underwear and pants.

  “No,” he said when she immediately reached for him, her small hand tempting him, making his voice harsher than he intended. “I’m going to restrain you.”

  He hadn’t unpacked, preferring for some reason to live out of his suitcase while he was at Aurore than to put his clothing in the closet and drawers, like a regular resident would. He found the tie he’d worn to the press conference and went behind Francesca. His cock jerked in the air when she immediately put her wrists behind her back. He knelt behind her, letting the tie fall to
his knee, and moved her rose-gold hair aside to kiss her fragrant neck.

  “You’re so sweet,” he murmured thickly as he began to unbutton her blouse, referring to her readiness to be bound, her insistence upon being there with him . . . everything. “I used to think I was taking advantage of you because you always gave yourself so freely, but you truly want to, don’t you?” he asked, his lips moving on her tender skin. He opened the placket of her shirt, his hands immediately seeking out her warm, satiny-smooth skin. He groaned at the sensation.

  “Yes,” she whispered harshly. His fingers slipped over the front of her bra, and he grunted in satisfaction when he felt the front clasp. He opened the garment, spreading the cups back over her breasts.

  “Yes,” she added emphatically when he filled his hands with the bounty of her bare breasts, shaping them to his palm, massaging them, pinching the plump nipples, glorying in her flesh. He watched over her shoulder, spellbound by the sight of his large hands on her full, soft breasts.

  “Arch your back again,” he ordered softly near her ear. He salivated when she did as she was told, her spine curving, the mounds of her breasts rising. He pulled her shirt and bra down over her upper arms and left them. She was bound by the garments, but it pleased him to restrain her wrists as well, so he did so quickly with the silk tie.

  Her hair was scattered on her shoulders when he walked around to the front of her, her bare breasts heaving. She kept her back arched, displaying herself without a trace of the embarrassment she might have shown in the same act even a year ago. Her eyes glittered with excitement when her stare lowered to his cock protruding from his fly.

  His hands itching to touch such a flagrant display of erotic beauty, he leaned down and stroked the sides of her ribs, feeling her shiver. He squeezed her breasts into his hands, knowing just what she liked—a little rough, a little sweet, greedy, and even lewd. He slapped the side of one breast lightly, watching as she bit her lush lower lip to stifle a moan.