Dream Huntress (A Dreamseeker novel) (Entangled Ignite) (14 page)

He popped open the button on her shorts and let them fall to the floor, leaving her in pink satin panties and her bikini top.

Stepping back, he scanned her nearly naked body from head to toe. He swallowed hard, and his nostrils flared. The look in his eyes reminded her of a wild animal someone had attempted to tame.

A punch of female power hit her full force. He was trying so very hard to slow things down, to make this special. But she could tell by the way he closed his eyes and took a deep, shuddering breath that he was fighting against raw need. They both were. But for some reason she didn’t fully understand, he was determined to batter her senses slowly.

He stepped close. His hands and lips continued their leisurely exploration of her body. Every tender, erogenous zone she possessed—her wrist, between her breasts, the sensitive skin under her navel—trembled with the need to feel more of him. He spun her, then caressed her breasts as his tongue danced a slow, tantalizing line down her spine. He missed nothing, teased every possible nerve ending to aching.

Breathless and impatient, she twisted in his arms, grabbed the waistband of his jeans, and ripped them open. “I appreciate the slow seduction, but—”

“Tonight’s not going to be like last night, sweetheart.” When she tugged on his zipper, he caught her hands and trapped them.

Through the almost blinding haze of lust, she began to understand. He was determined to take back the control that had so crudely been stripped from him last night. Their previous encounter had left them both reeling. Tonight, he was making up for his loss of control with deliberate, glorious torture.

Panting and on fire from his sultry burn, she discovered pride was no longer a factor. “I want you. No games this time, I promise. I just want you.” She’d never begged for anything in her life, but she’d never had a half-naked Tyler McGee touching her before, either.

“Soon.” He turned her again, pulled her backside tight against his chest. He cupped her breasts, and his coarse, masculine hair rubbed her back like an erotic lick against her skin. A large, hard erection pressed rigidly against her bottom. One hand circled her throat with quiet dominance and urged her head back against his shoulder.

“Now that we’re on the same page, I intend to enjoy you,” he murmured roughly against her ear, “and you damn well are going to enjoy me.”

“Oh, God, I already am. It doesn’t have to be like last night, but I can’t take this. I need you inside me, Ty.”

He laughed a low, throaty chuckle. “You are an impatient little thing, aren’t you?”

Breathless, she murmured, “Patience has never been my strong point.”

“I’d have never guessed.”

In a move so smooth she never felt it happen, he opened the clasp on her bikini top. Moving a hand to her breast, he rolled the aching tip between his thumb and finger. Her back arched into the pressure, inviting a stronger, rougher touch.

“Better?” He spun her, ducked his head, and sucked her nipple deep into the heat of his mouth.

Yes, God. Finally.

The pleasure pierced her right down to her core. Surrendering to the sensations, she let go. Let go of the case, the dreams, the awareness that she shouldn’t be doing this. He possessed her so completely that it was disturbingly easy to let the rest of the world simply fade away. Maybe tomorrow she’d regret her actions, but tonight there was only him. His hands. His body. His lips.

He picked her up. Her mind vaguely registered that they were both naked and she was now under him on the sofa.

Guiding her arms, he pushed them above her head and hooked them over the arm of the couch. “Don’t move them,” he ordered.

Her eyes blinked open. “What?” Desire muddled her brain. Comprehension was taking a minute.

“Be a good girl. No more hands tonight.”

Raising her head off the couch, she arched an eyebrow. “Someone really does like to be in control.”

That sexy, half-assed tilt of his lips made her feel as if her heart would beat right out of her chest.

“
Someone
would like to make a better impression than in our previous encounter. If your greedy, little hands enter the mix, I don’t stand a prayer of a chance, baby.”

Smiling, she let her head drop back to the couch, decided not to analyze why taking orders from him in this particular situation didn’t bother her a bit.

“Oh, God.” She groaned when he moved down her body and lightly nipped her breast.

“You are so damn beautiful, it messes with my mind. Sometimes, when I look at you, I can barely breathe.”

Her eyes began to sting, and her throat felt thick. It wasn’t the words—very likely there were more poetic phrases turned in the heat of the moment. But the tone in which the words were murmured, the raw way they tore from his heart, broke hers.

“Now, Ty. Now.” She tugged on a handful of his thick hair, urging his lips closer to hers.

He fumbled for something on the floor next to them, pulled up the handcuffs he’d tossed at her earlier. “Don’t make me use these.”

She grabbed them and threw them to the other side of the room, afraid he just might. God only knew she was well past the ability to deny him anything, but she needed to be able to touch him.

Instead of being inspired to return to her lips, he headed farther down her body, anchored himself between her legs, and ran his tongue lightly across the inside of both thighs. Her muscles tightened. He’d yet to touch her, but she felt the moisture pouring from her body.

He opened her, eased a finger inside of her as he buried his tongue against her sensitive bud, and licked.

She jerked but didn’t dare touch him, afraid he’d pause to scold her again. Anything that slowed the torturous pace wasn’t an option. He continued to nuzzle and torture her, continued to stroke a spot deep inside that pushed her to the edge of delirious.

“Ty, I’m going to come if you keep it up.”

Apparently, that was the intention. He groaned and moved faster, continued lashing his tongue against her aching flesh, and then slipped a second finger inside her. “Oh, God,” she cried, and still, he didn’t ease the pace. Her arms stayed locked against the sofa, but her lower half bucked wildly against him.

Sensations began to surge and splinter. She had no idea what kind of sound she made. A groan? A growl? Well beyond any kind of control, she gave him what he wanted—everything. Heart. Mind. Body. As long as he never stopped, he could have it all.

Her trembling moans vibrated louder as the force of her orgasm crashed around her. The air in her lungs rushed in and out.

Ty kissed his way up to her neck and then found her lips again. He was hard and ready, centered above her. The tip of his thick erection slid heavily against her slick folds, heating her again. Her hips arched to meet him.

His breath hissed between clenched teeth, and his body quaked.

“Protection?” he ground out.

“What?”

“Do you have protection, Jordan?”

She shook her head. Something told her it was going to take a lot more than a condom to protect herself from this man.

He got up, walked to his discarded jeans, and came back sheathed. In one hard, staggering burst of sensation, he buried himself deep inside her.

She gasped. Her body trembled. Every part of her shook, arms and legs vibrating against the deep, blissful pressure of his body inside hers. She hadn’t expected this, hadn’t known anything like it existed. She’d been touched before, in the most basic of ways, but not controlled like this, never destroyed like this.

He pulled back and then thrust again with a fierce groan. “Jordan,” he growled, “open your eyes, baby. Look at me.”

As she stared into his eyes, she felt him in the deepest marrow of her bones, felt the connection on a level so profoundly vulnerable it was terrifying. Tears streaked back into her hair. Her heart raced and thundered, trying to keep pace with her spiraling emotions. A blissful perfection and stunning fear warred inside her. She was coming undone in his arms and didn’t have a clue how to stop it.

He kissed her and thrust again, soothing tears and stirring demons at the same time. Lacing his fingers with hers, he whispered her name. Her hands and body locked to his, and her heart tumbled in a free fall. She concentrated on his beautiful, beautiful eyes.

“I’m scared, Ty.” The words slipped out even as she wrapped her legs tighter around him, urging his body deeper inside of hers.

Did he understand what he was doing to her? Did he realize he was destroying the protective armor she needed to live, that once it was gone, there was nothing but fear underneath?

“I know, baby, but I won’t hurt you. I swear it,” he whispered.

For the first time ever, she felt…
stripped
in every sense of the word. Crying out his name, surrendering to the moment, her body quivered and trembled as the orgasm clawed its way from the inside out.

Curling his fingers in her hair, burying his lips in the curve of her neck, he moaned her name, shuttered, and came inside her.

Deep breaths and lingering tremors gave way to soft kisses and the peaceful quiet of the early hours of the morning. Shifting to her side but still tangled with him, Jordan stroked fingernails through the sheen of moisture on Ty’s back. He dozed, but her mind was too overwhelmed for sleep.

She tried to feel good about what just happened but couldn’t quiet the little voice of reason.

Be afraid
, the voice said,
because he’ll hurt you
.

She could feel it as sharply as the dreams that haunted her nights. If he found out about the visions, there would be hurt.

What they shared was more than sex. He was more than a casual fling, and she was more than the shell she claimed to be. She understood that now. Her heart ached with the understanding that one night with him would never be enough.

That knowledge also clawed at her from the inside out.

Chapter Ten

Ty opened his eyes. Something had woken him.

A moan? A scream? Had it been Jordan?

A jab powered into his ribs. Grunting, he rolled to the edge of the bed and sat up. Damn, her elbow worked better than an alarm clock. Amused, he watched her toss around.

The woman slept like a cyclone, twisting and turning all over the bed. He considered waking her, but when he held down her flailing arm and kissed her shoulder, she rolled over and became quiet.

He chuckled.

A light from the parking lot glowed through the mini blinds, illuminating the bedroom. Jordan’s bare, sleek back rose and fell as she took long, deep breaths. She was seductive even in sleep. His gaze traveled over her from the top of her blond hair down to the perfectly rounded bottom only half covered with the sheet.

A foreign pulse of emotion sizzled like a power surge. Possession, need, and—if he was being honest—a good healthy dose of guilt, rose up out of nowhere.

She’d given herself to him when they’d made love, in ways he didn’t expect. He knew she’d done it, seen the passion on her face, felt the surrender in the tears that almost choked her. He’d wanted more than sex, demanded it.

He closed his eyes, remembering how they’d reached for one another a second time in the darkness. The memory of her rising above him, taking him in, moving in a seductive rhythm while white slashes of light from the blinds fell across her naked body was a vision seared into his brain.

She’d given him what he’d asked for, a real piece of herself.

His eyes opened. And how had he repaid her? By hiding the truth. By hiding the real reason he wanted Buck behind bars.

He would tell her all of it, but not yet. Already she’d accused him of being too personally involved, and she didn’t know the half of it. If he confessed, she’d never agree to work with him, and she was damn well going to work with him. He’d sooner open fire on the whole strip club than allow her to set foot in that dive without him. But that probably wasn’t a smart thing to admit.

The clock read 6:17 a.m. A trip to the bathroom was in order, just in case her next jab was lower and more on point toward his bladder.

When he turned the water on to wash his hands, he heard the scream. Sprinting back to the bed, he found Jordan, apparently in the grip of a nightmare.

She sobbed and cried out. Most of the sounds were unintelligible half-words and sickly, terrified moans, but he thought he caught the name “Katy.”

“Jordan? Jordan, wake up.” His instinct was to grab her and hold her, but the last time he restrained her hadn’t gone well. He picked up just one hand and squeezed. “Jordan?”

In one quick, sweeping motion, she woke, sat up, and scurried off the bed. Backing into a corner, she slumped to the floor like a cornered animal.

…

Jordan felt a dizzying flood of air fill her lungs. Folded on the floor with her head in her hands, she began to battle back the visions. Knees tucked under her, she rocked, desperate to break free of the faces.

Her mom’s. Her sister’s. And worst of all, the one face she’d fought against seeing for years…her father’s.

Why did every dream have to end with his disappointed eyes staring her down? She sucked in more air to clear the burn in her lungs and erase the faces. A sob welled in her throat.

Maybe her dad was right. Even though his pathetic lifestyle had led a murderer to their home, she was the only one who’d really had the tools to stop what happened, yet she hadn’t.

You could have saved them. You should have tried harder.

The vision she’d had the night before her family was killed had shown the gunman coming with absolute clarity. Still, she’d let everyone she loved die, let them silence her, treat her like a foolish ten-year-old. And it had cost her everything.

Her sister’s death was the worst. She could still hear Katy crying out.

Then the mystery girl with the long, dark hair cried out, too. The dreams had blended and twisted until she couldn’t tell where one ended and another began. Both violent. Both deadly. Who
was
this girl? And why the hell did the vision of her death hurt as badly as Katy’s?

Jordan kept her eyes closed tight as she continued to gulp in long, shuddering lungfuls of air. She couldn’t shake the images this time. The terror. The pain. Katy’s cold, empty stare after the sound of gunfire. Then the vacant gaze of the mystery girl as she slipped away, too. The boy put his hands around her neck and squeezed until her big, beautiful eyes, fierce and alive, drained to cold, hollow stones.

The boy hadn’t planned a murder. He’d planned sex. Sex could be explained. Sex could be rationalized as mutual. Murder hadn’t been on the agenda. He’d squeezed her neck, then let go. Squeezed and let go, unsure of what to do, where to turn. Finally, there were no more chances. The girl was gone.

Rein it in, Jordan. Take a deep breath.

Nausea, greasy and slick, roiled inside her.

She needed to get to the bathroom. She needed the shock of cold water on her skin.

Slow, deliberate steps came toward her. Oh, God. She wasn’t alone.
Ty.

She heard him kneel beside her.

“Are you okay?” He touched a cool rag to her cheek. “Do you know where you are? Can I help you?”

His voice was soft and kind and would have been extremely comforting if she hadn’t felt so sick. She lifted her head to look at him. “Oh, God, I’m sorry—” She jumped up.

Not quick enough, she realized, with the cold rag or the shower. She dashed past him and into the bathroom. Experience told her that throwing up was best at this point. Get it over with quickly. Get coffee. Move on.

She dropped to her knees.

When he approached the bathroom, she slammed the door.

He opened it. “I’m coming in, okay?”

“No.” The sickness tore through her a second time. “Don’t you dare,” she croaked, leaning against the toilet.

He stepped in with her robe.

She rubbed the cool cloth he’d given her across her face. “Don’t you ever listen?”

“Not very well,” he answered. “Come on, let’s get you up.” He tugged her to her feet and wrapped the thick, burgundy robe around her shoulders. “Are you sick? You’re shivering. Should I turn up the heat?”

She shook her head. It wasn’t cold in the apartment. It wasn’t the flu. It wasn’t food poisoning. It wasn’t anything that could be explained logically. She shook her head a second time. Finally, he backed out of the bathroom and allowed her a minute.

Her knees trembled. The thought of what had happened made the nausea return; he’d witnessed another dream. What a mess. She stared at her ghostly complexion in the mirror. Splashing cold water on her face and brushing her teeth didn’t give her nearly enough time to come up with a logical lie.

She walked out of the bathroom feeling caught and cornered. He deserved some explanation. He deserved a normal woman who could be truthful and honest, but her truth just wasn’t an option. She’d never risk looking into his eyes and having him look back as if she were crazy. History told her that’s exactly what would happen. It
had
happened.

After her family’s murder, she’d trusted the people who claimed they only wanted to help. She’d told the police and the social workers about her dreams. Then she’d spent the next few years paying for it. Admitting to nightmares and conversations with the dead didn’t get her help—it had gotten her labels.
PTSD, psychological trauma, severe anxiety, nightmares.

It had also gotten her forced visits with a shrink who believed all of her sleep issues could be fixed in the form of a pill. As an adolescent, she may have been trapped in the system; as an adult, she had a choice.

That
choice
included happily eating a bullet from her own gun before spending a single second of her adult life in the same antidepressant haze she’d spent a good portion of her childhood.

Ty was a good man, but it didn’t mean he’d understand her dreams.

“I started a pot of coffee,” he said. “Come sit down.”

When she didn’t move, he stepped closer and slipped his hands around her waist. His lips brushed her forehead, and the hot jolt of need was nearly painful. Melting against him, she trembled at the feel of his warm body holding her.

“Oh, God.” The plea ripped from her throat. She’d made it almost thirty years without getting into this kind of mess. Her entire adult life, she’d avoided this kind of intimacy to escape this exact moment. She’d done the one thing she promised herself she’d never do: let a lover in. Now she had to push him away.

“I can’t do this, Ty. I’m sorry.” Looking at him wasn’t an option. Turning away, she stepped toward the one small window in the apartment.

He walked up behind her and settled his hands on her hips. “You seemed to do fine last night.”

“It’s not a joke. I’m not ready for what this feels like it’s turning into.”

His hands dropped. In the silence, his breathing went faster, deeper, and, she was quite sure, angrier.

Forcing herself to face him, she prepared for the fight. “I tried to tell you from the beginning, I don’t do this. My job, my life, it’s just too…” Her throat swelled, and she blinked, determined to hold back the tears attempting to form.

“You’re trying to push me away because of a couple of nightmares? That’s ridiculous. You think I don’t understand the stress you’re under because of this case? You think I haven’t driven myself crazy worrying about the best way to take the Bucks down?”

“It’s not just this case. There’s more.”
A hell of a lot more.
“My life…It’s just…I can’t, Ty. Please just leave it at that.”

The thoughts were there, but she couldn’t get the words out. In the past, kicking a lover to the curb had filled her with relief. Now, her knees were ready to buckle under the weight of the regret. “I’m sorry.” She turned away again, knowing she could never look in his eyes and end it with dignity. “I’ve messed up, and I don’t know the best way to fix it—”

He spun her back around. “Then I’ll tell you. You’re going to continue with this case, and you’re going to continue being with me. We’ll work together, and when we’re done, the Bucks won’t be seeing the light of day for a very long time.”

The delivery of his words was as confident as ever, but she saw the glimmer of uncertainty in his expression.

“Then things will get better. The stress will get better,” he said. “The nightmares will get better.”

“They won’t. You’re not
listening
. They’re not going away. I’m trying to be honest—”

“Then try being honest with yourself first. After last night, can you really push me away and be done with me? I don’t think so.”

Habit made her want to lash out, verbally shred him with some flip remark, but his eyes held enough heat to silence her.

His grip tightened on her shoulders. “There’s no way you can pretend last night didn’t mean something. Is that
really
what you want? For me to walk away and not look back?”

She wanted him to stay, maybe more than she’d ever wanted anything. But it wasn’t realistic, and the longer she let him stick around, the more it would hurt in the end. “If you have any brains, you
will
walk away, and you
won’t
look back. I’ve been lying to you since I met you. My family didn’t die in a car accident…They were murdered.”

…

Ty wasn’t entirely sure he’d heard her right. “Your family was murdered?”

Jordan nodded.

“But you said there was a car accident.”

She knuckled the tears away. “People understand car accidents. Since it wouldn’t be polite, they don’t ask questions.” She exhaled on a bark of hysterical laughter, but her chin quivered. “Murder, on the other hand…No one understands murder.”

The words sliced through him. He understood murder. Enough to know it cut you off at the knees, leaving a big, gaping hole forever. He sucked in a breath and swallowed back his own memories, trying to focus on what had happened to Jordan. “How?”

Her teary gaze locked onto his. “A gunman broke in to my home when I was ten. He shot my family on Thanksgiving night. I only survived because I cowered in a closet.” The words spewed out, full of anger and self-loathing. “I did nothing, absolutely nothing, while some crazy son of a bitch killed everyone I loved. I have nightmares. All the time. They never go away, Ty. Never.”

Of all the things he expected her to say, it hadn’t been that. He eased closer, but her eyes opened wide.

She backed around the small dining table, putting a very clear barrier between them. “The nightmares don’t come every night.” Her face blanched, her words barely a whisper now. “But often enough.”

His mind raced as he tried to figure out what to do for her, what to say. But experience told him that no words were going to make it any better. He swallowed, working up the nerve to ask, “Who’s Katy?”

Her gaze shifted restlessly around the room, as if searching for an escape. He wondered if he hadn’t been standing between her and the door, if she may have just bolted. Finally, she exhaled a long, defeated breath and allowed her eyes to settle on him. “Katy was my sister. She was eight when she was murdered.”

Her admission powered into his gut like a physical blow. The image of a little girl hiding in a closet, listening to her family being killed, stalled in his mind. Momentarily frozen, he forced himself to breathe and absorb the enormity of her words. Honestly, he wasn’t sure whether to push for more details or insist she stop. “Do you want to tell me what happened?” he asked softly.

She shook her head as if she couldn’t bear it, but spoke anyway. “Katy and I spent the whole day cooking with Mom. My dad had been gone for weeks.” She shrugged. “He was always gone, but Mom said he was coming home for the holiday, and she was like a different person when he was there, so happy and…”

Ty tried to piece together the details. “Your dad traveled? Like a salesman?”

“Oh, he was a salesman all right. Just not the kind you’re thinking of. My mom said his job kept him away, but even at ten, I knew things didn’t add up. Katy and I would listen to her cry at night, sometimes until she passed out. We were little, but we knew it wasn’t right.