Snatched (17 page)

She remembered that it was
sangria
that had gotten her in trouble. She would never have thrown that piece of meat if the alcohol hadn't lowered her inhibition and raised her frustration level.

"What are you thinking?" he asked out of the blue and she realized she had been staring back at him during her reminisce.

"I'm thinking of my life and how I got here."

Unexpectedly, he smiled
slightly, which was
followed by a quiet chuckle.

"I can't believe you took me down with a rib tip."

The thought of that moment came back fully and despite her stress – or maybe because of it – she felt a
smile forming against her will.

"I always had a mean throw. Was second fielder on my junior high softball team."

"You missed your calli
ng then."

"Yeah, investment banking wasn't all that I thought it would be.
"

He gave her a quizzical look. "I wouldn't have pegged you as a banker."

"Well, you wouldn't be the only one," she said a little bitterly. "Which is why I decided to go another route. But
it
didn't turn out like I hoped."

A pause before he asked, "Was that what set you off that day?"

S
he reluctantly nodded her head.

"Life gets in the way some days. You expect one thing, then something else happens. Look where I am. I went to get a consultant job and wound up the kidnap victim of a motorcycle gang. Talk about a segue."

She couldn't help the tearing. It was her body's natural response to all of the hell she'd been through. Just one small, irrational act and she'd changed her life immeasurably. She didn't know if she would ever get the chance to go back to the way it had been. To just live without fear.

As though he had read her thought, he stood up and walked over to her, took her by either arm.

"It's going to be all right. Somehow we're going to get out of this."

"How? I don't want to die. I don't want you to die."

Despite her earlier
silent
declaration that she didn't care, she reluctantly admitted to herself that she did care whether he lived or died. That she wished that this wasn't his life.

"Nice to know you care," he said with a s
light
grin
. "I'm used to taking care of myself."

He released her arms, walked to the kitchenette, pulled out two bottles of beer, uncapped them, walked back and handed her one. She would have refused, but she was thirsty. Even hungry.

Alcohol in a situation like the one she was facing was a bad idea. Still, after he handed the bottle to her, the yeasty smell
of the brew teased her
and
overcoming her inhibition,
she took a much needed swig. Then another. The cold wash felt good going down her throat. In a couple of minutes, she had downed the whole bottle. As the alcohol settled in her stomach, it killed off those pesky bats
that had been flying around down there.

That was probably what he had hoped, to calm her down. Liquid courage sometimes did that for her.

He had finished his own drink, and he grabbed the bottles, tossed them in
to
the nearby waste pail. The
glass clanged against the metal
.

The alcohol had done something for him, too. There was a little something more in his eyes when he looked at her.

"Tell me, why is
n't a man coming to your rescue?
I mean, isn't there someone out there calling around frantically trying to find you
?
"

"How do you know there isn't?" she asked resentfully, the resentment rising because the question had uncomfortably hit on the truth. She had no one. Even her relatives were out of state. And she'd gone incognito before so no major alarms were going to be raised for another few days.

Enough time for her to have gone missing and gotten herself killed.

"There's been no news about you. No one raising hell. Even with the witnesses."

The anger was unexpected and painful. She'd been kidnapped in the open and no one had even thought to call the police. As though her life didn't mean shit.

She had no
where to turn that anger but on him.

"Don't worry about who cares about me. And what's your story? Probably
an abusive parent
in the woodpile, otherwise why are you where you are right now? No one cared right?

He winced and
she
took some satisfaction that
she
'd
hit a nerve.

"You know, you can be a bitch when you want to be," he said
, his eyes a bit darker
.
Anger and alcohol, a
caustic
mix.
Not
good
for him, definitely not for her.

"Better a bitch than a punk, and that's what you are. Rez says jump and you ask how high.
Just admit it, h
e owns you."

"Nobody owns me," he said.

"If no
one
owns you, you would let me walk away right now. But you know that you can't so you won't.
You're
Rez's bitch just like that
other
bitch
of his
!
"

The thunder in his expression told her she
'
d gone too far.
In two steps, he strode to the door.

"You want to leave,
here'
s the door
!
Go on, get the fuck out
!"

He unlocked the door,
slammed it open. Stood waiting for her to
go
.

But s
hock
glued
her feet
to the floor.

Her feet knew there was no way she could survive
out there
alone
even
as
her brain told her to leave
, to get free of the gang, of him
.

"What are you waiting for?" he asked cruelly.

"I…"

"You what?"

"I can't," she said quietly, all of her anger replaced by cold dread.

The sound of her fear was in her voice. In the visible tremor going through her body.

One moment he stood sentry at the door, an angry angel ready to oust her from her only haven. But
hearing her voice,
the thunder left
his face
. The storm subsided. With a sigh, he closed the door.

They
were
at a standstill. She had
surrendered
but so had he.
And neither of them knew what to do next.

She closed her eyes for a second,
feeling
exhausted and frightened. When she opened them, he was there
in front of her
just a
breath
away.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I don't know why I keep fucking up."

"It's because you're scared. I get that. But
neither of us can afford to go crazy, especially not now."

His closeness was a palliative, driving all the crazy away.
Looking into his eyes, she saw something steadfast, something comforting. As though he would take away her fear if he could. And in that moment, she decided to trust him again. If only for the time they had together.

When she reached for him, she knew that it was stupid, foolhardy. Dangerous even.

This wasn't the place
n
or the time.

Y
et neither of them care
d
.

With quick,
desperate
motions h
e
yank
ed o
ff the jacket he'd given her earlier
and
maneuvered her out of the bra in
as
many seconds.
Just as desperately, she
pull
ed
up
his shirt up and over his head, tousling
his hair.
Within a minute they both stood topless. The cold
fact of their nakedness momentarily gave them pause as the enormity hit them. She started to pull away but he grabbed her arm, pulled her into his naked torso.

The muscles
of his chest
were hard
and smooth
beneath the palms of her hands.
His
skin
felt
hot
to the touch
and even as she wondered if he was running a temperature, equally
searing
lips
moved over
hers,
his tongue pushing in
.
The after taste of beer suffused her mouth.

Even as he took her lips, his
body m
oved hers back, back until
the edge of the bed
hit the back
side
of her knees. He pushed and she
s
tumbled
onto the mattress
.
He stood over her,
and as she looked upward, she was taken aback just how hard he looked. The unkempt hair, the unshaved jaw, the dark eyes.
A tattoo of an eagle straddled the width of his chest. Right now h
e
was
as threatening as any of the Demons. And again, she was
unnerved
at the thought
.

He
bent and
roughly
pull
ed
at
her jeans
and that action pushed away her hesitation. She wanted this.
Needed it.

She maneuver
ed her hips
left and right, allowing the material to slide downward.
The jeans were tossed to the floor and her panties
and shoes
soon followed.

Being totally naked should have made her feel vulnerable.
Instead she felt freer than she had in days.
For this moment, there was no fear, no need to pretend, no shame, all of which she had felt since she'd been kidnapped.

She watched
him as he pulled off the rest of his clothes
.
And then he
stood there, no longer a demon but
again
the thunderous angel she had imagined him at the door.

As beautiful as any archangel, his musculature seemed carved from dark granite, perfect but for one blemish – a whitish scar
that ran along his left thigh.
It drew her eyes to the mat
of hair surrounding his swollen
dick
.

She didn't have a chance to wonder about the wound
for long. He moved
onto the mattress, hovering before
position
ing
an arm on either side of her.

His mouth descended over hers again,
sucked at her bottom lip, then traced his tongue along its contour.
She felt the head of
his penis against her stomach as well as a bit of moisture from his pre-come.

A hand spread apart her thigh
s
,
allowing
his lower body
to settle
into her crevice.
Her legs raised instinctively.
She sucked in her breath at the touch of his dick against her opening. But he didn't enter, not yet. Anticipation made her throb, expectation almost made her come.

He moved his mouth down the curve of her throat, down further still until his lips found one of her nipples. His tongue
trac
ed along the ripples of the orb
causing a
sensation
that
made her walls spasm
.

A
callused
finger pushed inside her
labia
, then two
,
then
three
.
They thrust
in and out in an achingly sweet rhythm that caused the nerves throughout her body to tighten, retract almost painfully. She needed a release and she needed it soon.
From the sound of his ragged breaths, he needed it just as badly.

The desperation in their motions, the way they clutched at one another simply manifested the underlying reality that this might be the last time either of them
would ever have physical release again.

By
tomorrow
, either or both of them could be dead.