Wild Dirty Secret(87)

He was on me, pulling off my clothes. My hand was caught, but it didn’t matter—he yanked it free, the whole shirt whipping over my head along with my bra, tumbling my hair from its ponytail. I gasped into his mouth, trying to catch up, but I couldn’t. He was moving too fast, climbing onto the bed, dragging my body beneath his as if I were prey and he a tiger gone in for the kill. His mouth glued itself to mine, taking away any sound as he settled between my legs, the hard ridge of his erection a blatant message that his lips hadn’t had time to speak. He rocked against me, and it hurt. I wasn’t ready, wasn’t aroused, but already my body prepared itself to receive him, well practiced in this, growing wet and swollen, supple flesh to be speared repeatedly. His hands were all over me, my waist, my arms, my sides—but not my breasts.

The door slammed open, and two very drunk, possibly high people stumbled into the room. Luke finally released me, looking up. I panted audibly.

“Ocupado,” Luke said in a guttural tone.

“Sorry, man,” the guy said. They both backed out of the room, closing the door behind them.

We collapsed on the bed for long minutes after they left.

“Okay,” I said, still panting. “I see what you did there.”

He let out a breath. “He’s not in this building, is he?”

“Don’t think so.” I felt a little woozy. The ceiling made lazy swirls above us, like a big upside-down bowl of batter. Allie was a baker. She loved to bake all sorts of things. I wasn’t as good as her, but under her direction, I could whip up a batch of cookies. That’s what this looked like, chocolate caramel cookies with streaks of beige and dots of black. Or was that the exposed pipes in the ceiling? It was hard to say. And all these thoughts about food were making me want to throw up.

“Damn.” Luke’s voice sounded far away. “I just assumed because there were so many. We’ve got to try the next one.”

“Okay. Have fun.”

There was a long pause. “What?”

Right. We were going now. I was sitting up…pretty sure. I stood and took a step forward and ended up slumping over in a graceless heap.

Luke caught me and hauled me back onto the bed. “Jesus, Shelly.”

“That’s not my name.” My words were slurred.

“It wasn’t just the adrenaline, was it? Oh fuck. What did you do? What did you take?”

“Don’t know.”

He was still talking to me, but all the sounds were like mush in my ears.

I opened my mouth to speak; I didn’t know if anything came out. Until I threw up, and then stuff came out all over the floor—that came out of my mouth.

Luke was there, behind me, supporting me, talking to me, saying urgent words that washed over me. I wanted to go to sleep. Didn’t he see that? I was tired. But then, bless him, he did understand. He tucked me into his arms and told me to close my eyes, don’t make a sound. Hah! As if I could. Nope, I would be right here. He carried me for what felt like hours, days, or maybe just seconds, and tucked me into the backseat of the SUV we had parked a mile outside the compound. But what about the other guys?

“Just wait here,” he said, and yes, I could do that. I closed my eyes and slept.





Chapter Seven





The first thing that registered was the shaking. I was going to vomit, rattling about like a loose bit of change. My eyelids felt heavy. I would have given up, just drifted off on the turbulent waves and crashed onto the waiting rocks, but for his voice. Not Luke.

Henri. Now I was really going to throw up.

My mouth felt like cotton as I tried to speak, to warn someone. Even though I knew it was too late. Even though I knew I was alone in the dragon’s lair. Luke wouldn’t be here. Not any of the men. They would have died first. Or they had let me go. Sometimes you had to give up a pawn to win the game.

I blinked, and everything came into a dreary focus, like looking out a rain-drenched window. Those weren’t raindrops; they were tears. Not the healing kind, not cleansing—they fell on barren land.

Henri stared straight ahead, though I had no doubt he’d registered my waking. He was all black-suited cloth and shadows except for the glint of a ruby-colored vest. He was a smart man, but not the smartest. Strong, but not the strongest. Instead, he had an animal instinct about things of a dark and violent nature. It gave him an unnatural advantage, sustaining his position in the face of richer competitors. It must have been that, because he had been at the top since I had entered the scene.

“Where have you been, sweetheart?” he asked.

I shuddered, an involuntary response, inescapable remembrance.

There was a book in Philip’s stargazing room. It said that every planet, every moon was constantly leaving orbit—and constantly pulled back by the gravitational force. I couldn’t seem to escape Henri’s pull; I couldn’t seem to stop trying.