Is Three A Crowd? (2 page)

As they neared her pick-up truck parked on an old logging road, the dog started to growl again. Safely locked inside, Maris would have sworn she was being watched. Her hands went clammy and her stomach soured, a cold ripple of fear running through her.

Something was there. Something or somebody was watching her. The engine didn’t catch on the first try, and Maris broke into a cold sweat. Shin growled, baring her teeth toward the closed window. Forcing a deep breath, she turned the key a second time and the truck started. She was very careful to put her foot firmly on the brake as she shifted into drive. Maris slowly pulled away, Shin was scratching at the closed window. It took all her concentration to make it back to the main road. Just before the turn onto the highway she stopped, taking deep breaths and calming Shin.

Maris saw it, knew deep inside it wasn’t a vision. Black beady eyes stared at her from the woods, watching every move from about three feet from the ground. This had to be an animal. What else could it be? She never feared animals in the wild. Rather, she tried to respect their habitat. These eyes had been different, hard and calculating—almost human.

With precise movements, she drove back to the hotel. “No swim tonight,” she said to Shin who was eating her dry food as Maris washed up. “We’ll take a long walk around the town, get to know the area better.” Talking aloud to Shin was normal. She often held one-sided conversations since adopting the dog. At least she wasn’t talking to herself.

Their long walk took a short turn when she felt uncomfortable on the main road, wandering the storefronts.

It was nothing she could identify, just the same innate feeling of unease. Locked in the hotel room with her fast food take-out meal pushed aside, Maris took her cell phone in hand and placed the call she’d been dreading.

While driving back she decided not to reflect her insecurities about the woods on the job. Maybe there was some confusion with the arrangements. Mr. Radulf’s personal assistant, Aminta, had confirmed her e-mail with dates and schedule outlines. The phone number she’d been given for Chateau Munteanu was answered on the first ring, as if they’d been waiting for her call.

“Good evening, this is Maris Dusan. May I speak with Mr. Radulf or Mr. Aminta please?” Her voice sounded less stressed than she was prepared for.

“Just Aminta, Ms. Dusan. How can I help you?”

Suddenly she felt foolish telling a stranger somebody was watching her in the woods. Hedging, she cleared her throat. “I was just checking in. I wanted to let Mr. Radulf know I’m on site and schedule.”

“Yes, Ms. Dusan, we’re aware of your arrival and schedule.”

“Oh,” was all she managed.

“Is there something else?”

Maris wondered what the person on the other end of the phone was like. From his voice, she pictured someone mature, very formal, and probably European from his accent. She decided to try another direction. “Yes, actually, I was wondering if there were any other work crews on the site.”

“Has there been a problem, Miss?”

Maris immediately decided she heard concern in his voice. “No, not really, I just like to know my surroundings. I’ll get back to you when I finish the initial calculations.”
Did that sound professional instead
of paranoid
?

“Of course, Miss.”

“Thank you.” Maris shut the phone off, letting out a sigh. She made sure it was charging before settling into bed. Signals were hard to find on large plots of forestland, especially in the mountains. A weak battery wouldn’t help.

Double locked inside her room, she picked at her supper, losing her appetite when she remembered the two dark haired, dark eyed men who seemed to be everywhere she turned tonight in town, studying her closely—intently, she decided. Last night when walking with Shin, she’d seen another dark man across the main avenue who seemed to be watching her. She’d ended the walk because of his appearance. She’d dismissed it at the time, but she couldn’t put it aside tonight.

* * * *

What was happening to her? The question kept coming back to taunt her. The dreams had stopped the last few weeks, and she’d hoped somehow they’d miraculously disappeared forever. She had no memories of a time with the tall stranger with hazel eyes who ravished her in the dreams, his kiss and his touch so real even in her dream state. By the time she woke, the dreams faded, and only the remembrance of his touch on her skin remained.

He never gave her his name, never spoke to her. Rather, he appeared in her sleep, taking her to a wonderful place of sprawling lawns and forests to make love to her. Well, almost. Even in her sleep, he never actually put his penis inside her. His lips and mouth, along with his hands, roamed her body freely, bringing her to the eclipse and holding her when she fell. Maris knew she’d felt him, larger than her hand could hold, but he’d never entered her, only stroked her with his fingers. Their foreplay would turn frenzied until he’d finally pull away, his look of anguish embedded on her mind.

Lifting from above her, his wide shoulders blocked the moonlight as he looked down at her. He would dissolve from her sight and touch. She’d wake in her bed in her apartment with Shin sleeping soundly across her doorway.

The last dream had been different. He’d used his lips and fingers to arouse her beyond the pinpoint lights on her closed eyelids. He’d held her, soothed her, and when she woke, she knew she’d climaxed. Her own fingers slipping between her lower lips confirmed it. She would have sworn her thighs were chafed from his slightly graying beard, a beard she used to pull him closer. She remembered how her fingers slipped amongst the soft strands holding his tongue to her center until she felt the free flight of orgasm, confident he would be there to catch her.

At the time, she figured the dreams were some latent memories or wants pushing forward, a want she couldn’t have in real life and so dreamt up. Surely if he’d been a real person from her past, she’d have remembered him by now.

Her nipples stood to attention, heavy with a need she knew his mouth would soothe. Her insides heated, making her liquid without his touch, only the idea of him. She let her hand slip down and stroke herself, but it wasn’t the same. After several minutes of futile attempt, she gave up with a sigh. The image she conjured when she closed her eyes this time became disconcerting, reminding her of her other dream lover. Even though she was technically wide-awake, the dark stranger invaded her mind
—
actually her imagination, she acknowledged.

The image of this second man was the complete opposite of his counterpart. This man was dark. His brown hair was soft to her touch. His brown eyes reminded her of chocolate with a hint of mischief. She read lust and uninhibited confidence. His olive complexion and heady smile made her smile reflectively. The forbidden feelings he created were new and exciting, different from her hazel-eyed dream lover.

This man touched her differently. He wasn’t hurtful, but he was rather gruff. He didn’t slowly lavish her body with his affection, he touched her with purpose and direction. When he grasped her upper arms and drew her body to his lips, she felt the restraint in his hold. His demeanor was relaxed yet intent, experiencing the moment. He made her come from his kisses and touch. Her dark man filled her pussy with his fingers and dropped her from the cliff of orgasm with his tongue to her clit. He never put his hard cock inside her body either. While she remembered reaching to him, he too maneuvered his body from her reach, just as her fair-haired lover did.

Maris decided she’d found the best of both world. One lover was tender and gentle, the other brash and demanding. One lover was sensual; the other taught her body to lust for his touch. She acknowledged he’d visited her dreams, too, that he wasn’t a figment of her imagination. He didn’t invade her dreams as frequently as her green-eyed man, but he’d made her feel alive in a primal way she hadn’t known. With a sly smile, she decided the perfect solution would be to have parts of each man at the same time. Would she want two men touching her intimately? Would they touch each other sexually? Did she want to witness that or be a part of it? Only if it was her directing them. Such bold thoughts had never entered her mind before. Now the images of all three of them intertwined would not leave her dreams.

* * * *

Maris sat up abruptly, moving to the bathroom and splashing cold water on her face. Shin slept in front of the double-locked door, unfazed by her bathroom break. Staring at herself in the mirror, her brown eyes and hair seemed the same. Only she wasn’t the same. Deep within her, she knew something was changing. Maybe her memory was finally coming back. Maybe soon she’d find the piece of her history that went missing five years ago after the accident.

Dissociative amnesia, she’d learned, could cause a person to block out certain information, usually associated with a stressful or traumatic event, which left her unable to remember important personal information. The doctors told her the memories still existed but were buried deeply within her mind. They assured her one day they would resurface, triggered by something in her personal surroundings.

She could remember everything about her life, childhood, and adolescence. She remembered all her time at university and all she’d learned to achieve her degree in horticulture and landscape engineering. What she couldn’t remember were the details of her personal life. She had nothing to refer back to from about two years before the accident concerning her private life.

After the third dream, she’d started keeping a journal of the dates and situations, whatever she could remember when she woke. There was no rhyme or reason to the dreams. The nights before and during a full moon would always produce her hazel-eyed lover or her brown-eyed lover. The journal made her realize her menstrual cycle was in tune with the phases of the moon, so she accepted that her hormones drove the unspoken wants. Maris had stopped writing in the journal then, understanding it was a waste of time. Now she let the dreams wash over her and tried to accept them. She crawled back into the strange bed and literally pulled the covers over her head.

“No dreams tonight, please,” she prayed aloud. Settling back under the covers, she let her hand drop between her legs, squeezing her thighs tight hoping to ease the new ache that now seemed ever-present.

Chapter Two

Maris woke refreshed from a sound sleep with a renewed attitude. She had two workdays left in the woods, and then she’d move to the smaller outer buildings and finally the main house. She took time to eat the breakfast offered by the hotel and found the secondary road she’d marked on the north side of the property. At
noon
, she stopped to eat her deli lunch, feeling tired and lazy on a full stomach. She sat on the tailgate of her truck absorbing the sunlight, Shin asleep beside her. Forcing herself back to work, she walked along the north boundary and heard a strange noise. Shin heard it, too, growling and baring her teeth.

Maris’s heart started to pound, her stomach got queasy, and she started to sweat. Suddenly it seemed the woods around her were alive, the presence of the unknown overwhelming. The woods smelled sour to her instead of fresh. Turning in a circle, it seemed she was surrounded by sets of beady black eyes. Maris panicked, screaming aloud with a voice she didn’t know was inside her. It was an anguished noise, almost wounded-sounding. The noise stunned Shin, who stopped to stare at her while the woods around her became still, too still to be natural.

They were alone again, the set of eyes gone, the feeling of panic released. It was as if they’d never been there, but they had been, nobody would talk her out of it. Not that she’d tell anyone ever, they’d think she was crazy.

Shin’s tail started to wag. Behind her Maris felt a presence, not menacing this time, rather reassuring. His warmth and spicy scent filled the air around her. Maris turned slightly, his large hands stilled her. She caught only a glimpse of the light haired, bearded man. He didn’t speak, rather calmed her with his hands rubbing her upper arms. Maris closed her eyes and basked in the security of his presence. When she was calmed, his presence faded away, leaving her alone with Shin in the woods.

Maris forced one foot in front of the other, and with a snap of her fingers as a command, Shin scurried in front of her through the woods, coming out about a half mile from where she’d parked her truck. A black SUV was approaching on the dirt road, a small dust cloud announcing the arrival. She walked slowly towards the vehicles, Shin running ahead to the tall, light-haired stranger leaving his vehicle, standing to stretch to his full height. His short beard was visible, but his eyes were sheltered with dark sunglasses. He bent and petted Shin until Maris reached their position.

He was extremely tall with broad shoulders and long legs, and muscled thighs covered in tight denim. He wore work boots and only a light turtleneck sweater in the cool fall weather. He seemed impervious to the cold, while she pulled her collar tighter around her throat. Her stomach knotted in a different way. Her nipples hardened, she felt slick and ready, horny. Studying his lips as he approached, she almost reached to him without thought. Instinct had her dropping her already extended hand as if to shake his.