Passions Recalled: Forbidden Passions, Book 2 (5 page)

“What did they tell you, Celeste? That I didn’t want you? You want to know what they told me?” He waited until she met his eyes before continuing. “They told me you were dead.”

She gasped. At this range she could feel the heat, the fury, rolling off of him. She wanted to protest, but for some reason she was certain it was true. He slid his palms down the wall, gripped her hips and lifted her. He entered her roughly. No finesse. She didn’t need it, already impossibly wet, immediately convulsing around his cock.

“It won’t happen again, Celeste. They took you from me once and now that you’re back from the dead, I’ll never let you go again.”

Tears stung her eyes. It was so,
so
good, but as much as she wanted this fantasy, it wasn’t right. Not that that thought stopped her body from responding as he thrust into her, worked her into a frenzy of want and desire and another orgasm. When he slowed, when his movements inside her became as lazy as the tongue lapping at her breast, her brain reengaged. She started to worry again.

“There’s something I’m not remembering,” she whispered, more to herself than him. “What day is it?”

He looked surprised at the change of subject.

“Thursday.” His cock was still hard inside her. She closed her eyes and concentrated.

“Thursday…I remember Dad calling me Wednesday night and insisting I come home.” She blushed, remembering how she’d masturbated to Jason’s memory before that phone call. “So between yesterday afternoon and now I drove from Atlanta to Chattanooga to here. Where is here exactly?”

“St. Andrews Park. Outside Panama City Beach. Florida.”

She looked around the room. She couldn’t imagine him in Florida. Dolphin land.

“Why?” The question seemed to confuse him more, and he stepped back, giving her room to breathe. “Why are you in Florida? Why aren’t you living at the resort and helping your brothers run all the Leonidas businesses?”

“I left a long time ago. Everywhere I turned…I saw you. I couldn’t live with it.”

His voice was emotional, raw. She couldn’t say why but she believed him. She wanted to hate him, had half hated and loved him for the past year. Now he was back, screwing with her resolve to get on with her life, with her plans to meet someone else and get on with her life. Oh, shit. Derek! She was almost dating him and had just fucked the wrong man. Twice. How had she managed to forget that? She clapped a hand over her mouth, afraid she’d blurt it out and pretty sure Jason would go ballistic. He couldn’t miss her panic, damn the man. He released her slowly, let her slide down the wall until her feet hit the wooden plank floors, but kept his hands on her hips.

“What is it? You remembered something.”

She shook her head and tried to get free, to walk past him, but he wouldn’t let her.

“There’ve been too many secrets, baby,” he whispered. “What is it?”

His voice was soft, cajoling. But how long would that last? And why was she so relieved? Something about Derek… It just wasn’t there anymore. But he was her friend, the one who’d got her through Jason’s abandonment. Surely this awareness, this fear, was unfounded.

Jason moved his hands on her shoulders and held her still. “What is it, Celeste?”

“Didn’t you try to get on with your life? Find someone else?”

He grew very still, and she knew she was in trouble. She hated to hurt him and hated herself for caring, but what could she do? What should she have done differently? He’d disappeared from her life. Was it wrong for her to long for companionship? Just a little of what she’d lost?

And Derek… Well if that was a little too comfortable a relationship, so what? She’d had wild and passionate and look what it got her. But now she had to deal with Jason, and he grew more livid by the moment.

Grabbing her by the waist, he pulled her close and sniffed her. It was possessive and proprietary, and it pissed her off all over again. It was entirely too up close and personal for a casual werekind acquaintance. Despite just having had sex with him, could she call him anything more than that?

He didn’t smell anything but himself—couldn’t have—and relaxed marginally.

“Explain yourself, Celeste. Tell me what you’re holding back. Now. Or so help me, God, I’ll bend you over my knee, and it won’t be like old times. You won’t like it,” he threatened.

She met his gaze, hard and glittering green. He’d changed. She thought he probably meant just what he said. But she’d changed too. Was harder, tougher than he remembered. How to diffuse the situation? She shrugged.

“It’s been a year. It’s been a long time since I knew you wanted me.”

“So what? You’re fucking someone?” His voice got very, very cold. “Living with someone?”

“No,” she whispered, knowing with the possessive urges of a mate that he was going to explode even though the situation was innocent, trying like hell not to care. “Dating. A little.”

He released her as if she burned him, sudden and abrupt.

“Don’t leave this house,” he ordered, then shifted and ran from the room.

Chapter Three

As he ran, he decided to kill her father and spread pieces of him across the southern states. It was just possible—maybe—that Celeste didn’t understand the full nature of a mate bond, but Michael sure as hell did. Michael knew it was very unlikely Jason would ever commit to another woman. To allow Celeste to become involved with someone else when he knew Jason was unaware she lived—it was infuriating. Jason had never experienced such rage, so he had to escape the house. He didn’t want to take it out on Celeste.

But Michael. Michael had a lot to answer for.

And who was she dating? She hadn’t mentioned his name. Was he human? A werewolf? Was she fucking him? Jason stopped and dug his claws into the ground. He cut off the thought and started running again…getting overwhelmed with rage wouldn’t help him or her. He couldn’t afford that; he had to deal with the mystery of why she had shown up
now.
But maybe it wasn’t such a mystery.

Several months ago a werewolf approached him. He had a plan to take over Michael’s clan and a small role for Jason to play in it. To Jason the role wasn’t so insignificant though.

When Celeste died Jason had been in the process of branching out. He’d dreamed of having werekind-safe resorts like Refuge around the world and so began his career in real estate speculation. None of his plans had come to fruition—she’d died, and he’d taken off. But he found the risk of land development too addictive to give up. He’d just switched gears away from hotels.

So when the werewolf—Derek—came to him with a plan to ruin Michael, part of which was to take his prime piece of land, Jason had jumped on it. He couldn’t care less about the rest of Derek’s scheme and hadn’t asked. That land was Celeste’s, the only thing left of her, and he wanted it. He hadn’t believed Derek when he insisted Michael would contact him to mortgage the land, but he’d jumped on it when it happened, skipping the in-depth background checks he usually went through. If he’d done them, he might have discovered Celeste was alive. Then she sure as hell would’ve been here already instead of showing up now injured and unable to remember most of the last twenty-four hours.

The rain let up, and he slowed to a loose-limbed lope while he worked it through. Michael had accepted insane terms for the mortgage, terms no rational person would take. He either had the money in reserve for the first balloon payment, was certain he would or just didn’t care about losing the land. Since he was using it for his new business venture, that couldn’t be it. If he had the cash, he wouldn’t have needed the loan, which left being certain he’d have the money. So, why didn’t he? Normally before Jason decided to hand out so much money, he demanded business plans, financial records and made personal background checks. Normally he made people jump through hoops. In his haste to get the last piece of Celeste, he’d skipped all of that. But he bet Derek hadn’t, and that made Jason nervous. What was Derek’s motivation for going after Michael? Simple greed for power or something else?

A familiar scent came to him on a sudden gust of wind, and he lifted his head to search it out. Wolf and, since there were no wolves indigenous to this park, it had to be werekind. Stopping still in his tracks, he looked around but didn’t see anything other than storm debris and rain. Taking a deep breath, he didn’t smell anything other than salt water either. It was either his imagination or the werewolf was gone.

When the unfamiliar feeling of dread inched its way up his spine, he turned, running full out for home. He wasn’t sure how he knew, but Celeste was in danger.

Celeste stood frozen in place when Jason made his hasty exit. She felt rejected, confused and angry. The confusion she understood, but the other two? She’d accepted his rejection a long time ago and the new rejection, the new anger over something she should expect, fucked with her mind as well as the peace she’d carved out for herself.

To hell with this.

Curling her fingers into fists, she redressed quickly, took a final look around the room and walked out. He was off running in his other form, so it was the perfect time to get out of here. Listening to the howling wind and driving rain, she walked down the hall—he’d left the front door open—and onto the porch where she winced, her stomach clutching in dread. Wind blew the trees flat, and the relentless rain collected in pools around the yard. There was no way she was driving in that, and she couldn’t believe he’d gone out in it.

Fear for him was bad enough, but this new emotion was more like terror—at the realization she wasn’t going anywhere. She’d have to stay until this storm blew over and if she couldn’t avoid him, she was afraid she’d fall in love with him all over again. Snorting, she walked back inside.

Like I ever really stopped?

She had to figure out why she was here. She squeezed her eyes shut, willing the memory to come. Nothing did.

Pushing the door mostly closed, but not catching the latch in case Jason returned in wereleopard form, she walked back into the small living room. The wind blew the door open behind her, and it banged into the wall. She flinched and whirled around. Why was she so jumpy—because of the storm or something else? She walked over and slammed the door shut. He could just shift and use the knob like normal people when he returned.

Standing in the small living room, she sighed. Now what? She needed a phone, needed to call her mom and see what she knew. Frowning, she looked around. Where was her purse? Her phone? Where was Jason’s phone for that matter? She hadn’t seen one yet. She peered through the doorway on her left and saw a refrigerator, but when she entered and found a phone it was dead. She slammed it down in frustration and went to search the house. There had to be a cell phone. Maybe it would work.

She started with the nightstand in his bedroom and got the shock of her life when she pulled the drawer open. It couldn’t be the same box, but she knew as she reached for it with trembling hands that it was. Lifting it out, she set it on one open palm and frowned. Her chest expanded, shrank and swelled again. It took a moment for the sobs to register, and she gulped them down. He hadn’t kept the ring, had he? The ring she’d left with him when she’d flown home to explain things to her family. It was like watching a train wreck, her train wreck, as she flipped the lid open, saw the blazing red ruby circled by diamonds. She bit her lip and pulled the ring from the box. She held it a moment before sliding it on and holding it up to the light. He’d kept her ring. What did that mean? What else had he kept?

She set the box on the bed and stood. Hands on her hips, she looked around, wondering where to start. Afraid she’d find something else as disturbing in the dresser, she headed for the closet and opened the doors. She quickly flipped through everything in front and pushed them out of the way when she came to the items hidden in the back—the clothes she’d left in his quarters at the resort. Had he kept everything? She shrugged off the curiosity. Did it matter?

At least she could get out of this bikini now. She tugged a tank top and then a pair of jeans off hangars and carried them into the bathroom. Setting them on top of the closed toilet, she pulled the shower curtain back wondering if her shampoo and conditioner would be there, too. Thankfully, they weren’t. That just would be too creepy.

Turning the water as hot as it would go, she got in and soaped up, careful to avoid the bandage on her temple. With the electricity out she figured she didn’t have a long time before the water turned cold and hurried through the process. She squeezed some shampoo in the palm of her hand and fingered it through her hair. After she rinsed it, she stepped out of the shower, wrapped a towel around her hair and one around her body. She eyed her clothes and tried to remember if she’d left underwear in his bungalow a year ago. If she had, did he still have them? Not sure if she wanted the answer to that she decided to go commando and pulled on the jeans and shirt.

The material rasped over her sensitized skin. Her pussy grew wet against the hard crotch of the jeans and her nipples pebbled when the shirt brushed over them. She groaned. Would even her clothes conspire against her to keep her ready and willing for Jason?

She wanted him again already, with that deep craving she’d hoped to defeat. Turned out she’d only partially managed to numb herself to her body’s demands. Now that it was fully reawakened she didn’t think she could turn it off. Wasn’t sure if she even wanted to. It was a problem she wasn’t ready to deal with quite yet. She was stuck with him until the storm passed, might as well enjoy him while she could. She just had to keep her heart out of it so that when the inevitable happened, when he left her, it wouldn’t hurt as bad as before. He may have thought she was dead, but she didn’t have that excuse. She hadn’t insisted on speaking to him herself. She’d withdrawn in hurt and anger. Eventually he’d probably see her failure to contact him as a betrayal, or worse, cowardice. She couldn’t really argue he was wrong, either.

Sighing, she pulled the towel off her head and let the length of her hair fall down her back. A quick search of the bathroom drawers gave up a single comb but no brush. She decided to let her hair air dry while she searched the rest of the house.