Ellora's Cavemen: Tales from the Temple II (7 page)

Oh right, this man had no idea what she did for a living! As evidenced by his heated look. Otherwise, he’d have probably been turned off. Warmth infused her cheeks and her breasts tingled at the electricity in his gaze. Her name might be Erin, but who was she to correct him. He had a nice, soothing voice, laced with an unusual accent that made her new name sound poetic when he spoke. She wished she could place the accent. Maybe he was Native American. With his defined cheekbones, darker skin, and pitch-black hair, he could certainly pass for one.

He gave her a sexy smile as if he knew her very thoughts. Dipping his head, he said in a formal tone, “My name is Kian.”

39

Patrice Michelle

Shock slammed through her. Kian! The man who had somehow stumbled across her research theories for time travel? The man who had been emailing her for the past month trying to convince her that the world wasn’t ready for time travel and never would be?

She hit his shoulder. “Why didn’t you tell me who you were right away?”

He frowned. “Because we needed to concentrate on getting out of that dangerous situation, not stand around making introductions.”

Erin laughed at Kian’s statement. That was so like his email persona. Blunt and to the point. The introduction line in his first email to her:
I admire your brilliance, but you
have to stop trying to discover the ability to time-travel.

“Do you know I almost deleted your first email, thinking it was a joke one of my colleagues dreamed up. But when I reread your message, I realized you had knowledge about my project that none of my coworkers could possibly know.”

“I have a bit of foresight,” he commented with a smile.

She regarded him, still unsure how he fit into the whole picture, but something inside her made her want to trust him.

“Well, you did say something worth listening to when you told me to head in this direction if I ever got into trouble—that you’d find me.” She shook her head in bemusement. “Man, you do have foresight, don’t you?”

He chuckled at her comment. “Only when it comes to you, Eriana.”

She smiled and relaxed against him as he began walking once more. Just like his emails, Kian radiated a confidence that had at first provoked her anger via cyberspace.

Strangely, that same confidence comforted her in her current situation. She hadn’t felt so safe since this whole nightmare began, she mused as she pressed closer to his warmth.

True to his word, Kian approached a small log cabin in less than ten minutes.

Once he carried her inside the one-room cabin and kicked the door shut, Erin expected him to set her down. When he held on to her and started toward his bed, she tensed once more. “Um, I can walk and the couch will do—”

“No, your mind isn’t ready yet,” he ground out, his tone forceful and clipped as he tightened his hold on her.

She instantly stiffened at his tone and Kian relaxed his grip, saying in a calmer voice, “You need to get warm, Eriana.”

40

Dream Walker

Erin wanted to argue but now that the danger seemed less eminent, her teeth chattered and her entire body shook. God, she was chilled to the bone. No fire burned in the fireplace and the cabin felt cool as well. The fall wind howled, blowing hard against the wooden walls outside.

“I’ll start a fire.” Kian laid her down on the bed and started to move away.

A fire would be nice, she thought. Nice and warm and cozy.
The smoky smell of a fire
always makes me smile—smoke!
Smoke would draw the attention of the men pursuing her. His cabin was so secluded more than likely the men wouldn’t know it even existed as long as Kian and she didn’t do anything to draw anyone’s attention.

“Wait!” she called out, propping up on her elbows. The fast movement cost her and she quickly laid back down, her head reeling.

Kian stood over her once more, his gaze clouded with concern. “What’s wrong?”

“No fire, please,” she begged him.

His frown reflected his disagreement. “The fire will warm you.”

She glanced at the lamp he’d turned on near the bed, paranoia setting in. “No lights either. They’ll find me.”

Kian nodded his understanding and walked into the kitchen area to retrieve a couple of candles from the rustic-looking cabinet. The kitchen and living room took up half the cabin while the bathroom and bedroom took up the other half. The only room in the cabin with a door was the bathroom. Every other room in the house flowed into one another.

She noticed he didn’t have a kitchen table or a TV. But he did have a big soft brown leather sofa that faced the stone fireplace. The only other furniture in the room, other than the bed, was a wooden rocking chair, an oak chest of drawers against a far wall and a matching nightstand next to the bed.

As Kian lit the thin, taper candles he’d set in metal holders on the nightstand, he said, “Get out of those wet clothes.”

When he turned off the lamp, Erin started to unbutton her shirt, but she hesitated when he didn’t move away.

“Er, I know the cabin isn’t set up for privacy but…”

“Don’t be shy about your body, Eriana. The clothing we wear only covers who we really are,” Kian murmured in a dark, seductive voice.

For some reason, she didn’t fear him. Well, it’s not like he’d be interested in her body anyway, she thought with an inward smirk. She might be tall, but even as a teenager she’d never been super-model thin. Reaching thirty hadn’t changed that fact.

Of course, having mouse-brown hair and “nothing to write home about” features to boot didn’t make her very inspiring on the sexual attraction scale. Nah, he wouldn’t be interested in her.

“I give you my word I won’t touch you unless you wish it, Eriana.” His words rocked her world as he raked his heated gaze down her body.

41

Patrice Michelle

When his emerald gaze locked with hers in the sputtering candlelight, he reached up and started to unbutton his shirt.

Despite the chills racking her body, as she watched him peel away his shirt, an inner heat began to swirl inside her belly. The heat radiated to her breasts and pulsed to her sex in throbbing waves of awareness. Never had she had such a swift, gut-wrenching reaction to another person.

Her lips parted and she held back a gasp of admiration when he peeled away his shirt to reveal broad, muscular shoulders. His well-formed biceps flexed as he drew his shirt completely off, then dropped it on the floor. Unbidden, her gaze lowered from his smooth chest to his washboard stomach as he started to unbutton his jeans.

“I’m way ahead of you,” he said in a light tone, amusement lacing his words.

Erin’s breathing turned choppy as he unbuttoned his pants and kicked off his shoes before he pulled his wet jeans all the way off.

When he straightened, she greedily admired his sculpted form—his thick chest, narrow waist, muscular thighs. And to think she’d spent a month dodging his emails.

Oy! Her gaze traveled over his smooth olive-toned skin, not a single tan line to be seen.

Oh yeah, Indian! She’d put money on it.

He was a masterpiece to look upon and his perfection made her even more conscious of her own not-so-perfect body. She’d purposefully avoided looking at his groin. She didn’t want to see the evidence of his lack of desire for her. Her fingers stilled on the buttons of her top.

“I’ll get undressed in the dark.” She leaned over to blow out the candles.

“No, Eriana,” he commanded as he approached.

His intemperate tone stopped her short, but she kept her eyes on the candles, refusing to meet his gaze.

Warm fingers grasped her chin and tilted her head. “Look at me.”

The softening of his voice slid over her like a sensual purr, surprising her. Erin met his intense gaze.

Kian ran his thumb along her jaw line, then traced his fingers down her throat, causing a shiver to race down her spine.

“I know you have a beautiful mind and now I want to see the gorgeous body that goes along with it.”

She bit her lip and started to shake her head when Kian reached down and clasped her hand. His gaze never left hers as he took her fingers and wrapped them around his very hard, very impressive erection, while his other hand moved to the buttons on her blouse.

“We want the same, Eriana
,
” he said in a low, husky voice.

Raw desire reflected in his gaze as he unbuttoned the top button of her blouse, then another and another. Erin’s stomach clenched and her heart raced as he finished unbuttoning her shirt.

42

Dream Walker

Maybe if she distracted him, he wouldn’t notice her barely indented waist or her less-than-a-handful breasts. She clasped her hand around his cock and smoothed her thumb over the plumb tip, giving him a tentative smile.

Kian’s breath hissed out and he rocked his hips against her hand several times, his motions primal, but control evident as he ground out, “No.” Grasping her hand, he removed it from his erection.

Uncertainty swirled through her. Fearing she’d disappointed him, Erin bit her lip and looked away.

Kian pulled her to her feet. “If we can’t use the fire to warm you, I have a better idea.”

Before she could respond, he handed her a candle and scooped her up in his arms.

When he carried her toward the bathroom, she began to struggle. Oh no, a bath? She’d have to reveal her entire body to him. She wouldn’t be able to jump underneath the covers as soon as she was naked.

“Calm your fears, Eriana. You need to get warm quickly and this is the best way.”

When he entered the bathroom and she saw he only had a shower stall, Erin panicked. She obviously couldn’t take a shower without his help since she had a hard time just walking. As her breathing increased, her head began to throb.

“Just give me lots of blankets, Kian. I’ll be fine.”

He lowered her feet to the floor in the bathroom and took the candle from her hand.

Setting it on the sink, he shut the door and turned the shower on full blast. As the warm steam began to fill the room around them, Erin closed her eyes while Kian slowly removed her clothes. She didn’t want to see the disappointment reflected in his gaze when she stood naked before him.

When he’d removed her clothes, she stood there feeling completely exposed and vulnerable. Embarrassed heat suffused her cheeks despite the chills that racked her frame from head to toe.

I want him to touch me
, she thought wistfully.

Erin drew in a sharp breath of surprise when a warm mouth closed over one of her nipples. Her back naturally arched and her hands instantly moved to cradle his head as he sucked hard, pulling her nipple deep within his mouth, then lightly nipped at the pink tip. As heat infused her body from his attentive ministrations and her pulse began to rise, Kian moaned against her breast, lifted her in his arms, and stepped under the spray of warm water.

She wasn’t a small woman, but as the hot water pounded down on them, Kian held her as if she weighed nothing. Erin clung to his broad shoulders, reveling in the erotic sensation of his wet, naked flesh against hers. He felt hard and smooth and, God, she wanted to run her hands all over his body—feel every single dip and swell of the well-formed muscles that covered his frame.

43

Patrice Michelle

Before she could work up the nerve to act on her fantasy, Kian sat down on a bench built into the wall of the shower and leaned against the wall. Pressing her back against his chest, he kissed her neck and then her jaw. When she turned her head toward him, he captured her lips with his.

The glide of his tongue against hers, dominant and aggressive, told her exactly how this man would make love. Lurid thoughts of his body pounding into hers, giving everything and expecting just as much in return, entered her mind. Her heart hammered at the combination of his physical and her mental stimuli.

When he pulled a bar of soap from the dish above their heads and slowly rubbed the edge of the bar across each of her taut nipples, the tips hardened, causing warmth to spread to her sex. Suds began to form on her breasts and the heat of the shower and the exotic smell of the soap engulfed her senses, changing the source of her shivers from cold to sensual awareness.

As she watched Kian use the bar to draw a seductive line down the center of her body to the nest of dark curls between her thighs, her heart skipped a couple of beats before increasing to a wild staccato rhythm.

He slid his hand up her waist and across her belly until he cupped her breast, his touch possessive and firm. Erin bit back a gasp at his thoroughly intimate gesture, but when he rubbed his thumb across her nipple, she couldn’t resist reacting. She arched into his touch.

The rough pad of his finger dragged across the soft, pink bud. Her breath caught at the erotic sensation. She laid her head back on his neck in complete submission, enjoying every single sensation: skin against skin, wet and warmth, the heat of his body surrounding her, the building, spiraling, out-of-control desire raging through her body.

“Beautiful,” he murmured against her temple. “How can you not see how desirable your body is, Eriana?”

44

Dream Walker

She shook her head and moaned when he slid the fragrant bar into her curls, brushing the edge against her clit—once, twice, three times—before he dropped the soap to the floor of the shower.

Clasping her thighs in his large hands, he pulled, silently directing her to put her feet on his knees. Erin did as he bid, her breathing changing to a rapid pace as her body throbbed in intense need to be touched, to be caressed, to be…

Possessed
.

Kian’s hand slid into her soapy curls, his finger brushing down the front of her clit.

He played with her sensitive bud, back and forth, toying with her, creating a wave of desire swirling within her body that mimicked the steam curling around them. Erin rocked her hips, giving in to his masterful strokes.

Kian tweaked one of her nipples while he rolled the sensitive bud of her clitoris between his thumb and forefinger, and rasped in a very aroused voice, “
Kruma, a nara.
”