Wicked Hunt (Dark Hearts Book 3) (11 page)

Mustn’t.

I pulled away and shook my head, gathering calmness, sending water flying.

“Do we have a towel?” I was sure we hadn’t.

“No.” He smiled. “Walk dry.”

The man had the prettiest hazel eyes. And I was confused. Walk dry? Perhaps that was for the best when he had me so aroused.

Some facts and a question might distract my mind.

“I have a question.” I picked up my clothes, finding I could carry them even if fine control was difficult. I’d swallowed some water too and realized thirst had been making me weak. I should’ve waited and drunk bottled water, if we had any, but the need had been great.

When I sucked in a breath, he followed the movement of my chest, my breasts.

My illness must be stopping him.

“Right. I think I’ll at least put this on.” He didn’t stop me from trying to pull the T-shirt over my head, and didn’t help either. The cloth stuck to my damp skin but I felt less threatened even partly dressed. My panties were very wet by the time I had them on.

My hands were improving. Yay, team.

My jeans would be impossible with wet legs. I used them to dab off some of the water then gave up. Maybe there was a skirt at the room.

The question.
“Are you...having trouble with saying words?” That was very direct, but I wanted to highlight that we had to find this doctor ASAP.

His jaw muscles worked. “Yes.”

“Then your illness is getting worse.”

He stared from beneath his brows. “My illness?”

“Yes. Yours. The mesmer thing. Remember?”

Was it worse than I thought? “Do you remember about mesmers?”

“Yes.”

Thank the heavens above. If he forgot that, we would be truly lost.

“We should go back,” I said softly.

I started back to the building, feeling odd with only panties and shirt, but figuring it wasn’t far. A splash of color caught my eye and I realized it was the orange logo I’d seen on the SUV the night before, while under the airport lights. The car was there. The phone might be there too?

I took a detour, heading for that orange color.

“Just...” I pointed, with my hand. “Need to see something in the car. Okay?”

He didn’t reply, only followed, naked, with his own bundle of clothes in one hand.

We should found a nudist colony.
The thought made me smile. Thai jungle nudists. The things I did in the name of saving Grimm. I was going to be covered in mosquito bites.

Darkness was seeping through the forest, but I figured the car was barely twenty yards away. By the time we reached the SUV, I’d only had one heart attack – from a snake slithering through the leaves a few feet away.

I laid my hand on the hood and thanked whoever was up there in the sky above. Grimm was behind me and he’d not allowed me to have the phone before, yet I could see it, lying on the front seat.

“Hey.” I turned to him, hoping the bra in my hand was concealed by the jeans. “I think I left my bra behind. Could you go get it?”

“No?” He cocked his head. “I...don’t think so.”

“I did. Uh huh.” I nodded. “Please?”

He turned and walked away. When he was most of the way back, I dodged around to the side and opened the driver’s-side door. The passenger door was wedged in some bushes. I’d have to climb inside past the steering wheel.

He was still walking away.

I pushed the door open further, wincing at a creak, then I climbed in. My hand was on the phone when I registered crashing noises.

Grimm was bounding back. I wasn’t sure if he knew my aim but the sheer noise of his running gave me kamikaze butterflies in my stomach.

Fuck. Do it or die.
I could pretend. I hadn’t time to send a message, talk, tap the number. I flung the phone down and wormed out backward.

By which time Grimm had arrived. He grabbed me by the back of my neck and my arm and hauled me out all the way, until my feet hit the ground.

From his glower, he knew.

“Bugger,” I whispered. “You
know
we need to do this.”

“No.”

“We do!” Now I had anger, not prime quality rage, but close. “We have to!”

“You yell?” He screwed up his mouth.

*****

Grimm

She defied me. I knew this. Lied. I blinked away water and sweat, eyed the plump butt under my hands. Her struggles...Zorie’s...made my hands shake, my muscles ache, my cock throb, as I thought of fucking her.

I must not. Sickness was in her. In her hands. Her poor bandaged hands.

I cared for her as well as possessed. Had to keep her safe.

The guard had endangered her. So did the doctor. I could smell it in the words.

Maybe I could.

Maybe I was wrong. I could think better than I could speak.

My mouth didn’t let me say the right words.

And I’d read books.

My new limits made me angrier.

With my hand on her back, I pressed her down.

I grated my teeth as she kicked her legs under me. Strong kicks. She could walk, run, scream. Zorie was mine. And she’d lied to me.

Fucking her was my right.

Her shirt had dragged up above her tits. I could see one squashed sideways. Pleasing curves. I moved my body away and saw the cloth between her legs was twisted, exposing her cunt. She lay across the seat, panting, waiting. Then she looked back at me.

“Grimm?”

Snarling was what I needed to do. Fucking her was.

No.
I made a smile, kept it on my lips. “Shhh.”

The beast in me rumbled and retreated. Still there, prowling, contained.

Protecting her, that was my motto. My primary need. My...

I’d kept my hand on her back. The other on her bare hip.

Her ass wriggled against my cock. She sucked in a breath, huffed it out in a small sound – a whimper, a moan. It was a female noise that beckoned.

The beast bared its teeth.

The smell of jungle, the drip of water, the rattle of shaking leaves, and the fat snakes exploring where the trees drank of the earth...it stirred that thing that prowled, made my cock ache to fuck this girl I owned.

Don’t hurt her
, I reminded myself.
Don’t.

*****

Zorie

He spun me, pulled me past the open door, and shoved me against the car, pinning me there on my back with a hand on my neck. All my pent-up arousal slammed into me, full force, as solid as the hood under my back.

Get angry
. I had to get angry.

“You lied. You lied.”

His hand arrived between my legs. Mouth open, I watched as he pushed one, very
thick
finger inside me, slow but steady, then wormed in another on the outstroke. My thighs shook then parted. Every single inch of his invasion was exquisite. I panted, lost for words, flooded with sensation.

Fuck mesmers.

For a second, my eyes rolled up, then I made myself look at him again as he fucked me, his arm pumping. My breasts rose and fell, my pinkish nipples a stark contrast against my skin. They pointed at the sky, on display, as if to show how damn aroused I was.

“More?”

As I began to choke out a reply, on the next outward stroke, he inserted a third finger, and stuck all three deep into my wetness, until my pussy walls seemed stretched beyond the point where it was possible.

Rage? God no. I sprawled onto the warm metal and groaned, legs splayed, wriggling, wanting the
more
he’d promised.

“More?” He mouthed the words into my ear.

I shivered, whining. “No. Can’t.”

“Now...my cock.”

I gasped at the last slam of his fingers into me, dreading his cock there.

He dragged me sideways, rolling me until I was spread chest-first over the hood, my legs dangling and not touching ground. I couldn’t move, didn’t want to. I simply set my arms on the hood, and waited, only squirming on his fingers in a silent plea.

More.

He hitched his body into me, jolting me when his thighs hit mine, then his cock poked between my legs. It found that place, a wonderful spot just beside where his fingers jutted from me.

I imagined how it must look. Imagined all of that squeezing up there.

I couldn’t fit him in there, surely, but...I wanted him. I wished for a pussy like a tardis, capable of taking whatever he wanted up there. I thrust backward, then deliberately relaxed my entrance muscles, as I tried to accommodate. Both cock and three fingers wormed into me.

The very tip of his cock seemed to push in, stretching me to the utmost, and more,
more
.

Sightless, I clutched at the smooth metal and begged.

At the last moment, before his cock could do what it wanted, he pulled out his fingers then began to fuck me in earnest.

The SUV rocked and creaked, shook and almost moaned on its tires as he banged into the back of my thighs. Each inward fuck was creating wet sounds as the moisture sucked on his flesh, sticking and helping him squeeze high inside me, slide up there. Stay there, moving in circles, moving my body into the hood, squashing me breathless.

I forgot to breathe, enraptured at the feel of being filled. I worshiped his cock with my cunt, wrapping around him, fucking him also as I shoved back into him.

Caught at the edge of ecstasy, I felt the swell of his cum, then the dribble and gush as he removed his cock.

Emptiness, and I hadn’t come.

I wriggled on the hood, sure that more was yet to come, but he only pulled me from the hood. My belly adhering there and made weird squeaking noises as I unstuck.

Trembling, needing to climax, and still so close to it I was mindless, I looked up at him.

His thumb and finger stroked my lips. The ache of a mesmer touch toyed with me. One fingertip on my clit would’ve done it.

I tried to drag his hand down but he shook his head.

“Come. Wash again.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

Disbelieving still, for no mesmer had ever left me high and dry, minus orgasm, I staggered after him. His fingers clasped on my wrist made that mandatory.

We washed again, my panties also, then he turned and pointed.

“Let’s eat. No car this time. No phone.”

Words, at least he knew words still. The complexity of his sentences seemed to wax and wane. I craved masturbating but knew it would be fruitless. Damn him. Was this deliberate?

Zorie

Deliberate for sure. We slept, awoke and he touched me without relieving my needs until my head spun with thoughts of getting off. At least he didn’t fuck me again but, being a mesmer, he didn’t need to.

My rage. I knew why I hadn’t found it again. I didn’t hate Grimm. I was here because I knew what he’d been and wanted to fix him.

He’d fixed my hands. Now it was my turn. But I needed to get him to the doctor for that.

Each morning a young woman arrived with food and whatever else he asked for. I couldn’t feel her as a collectable but perhaps being with Grimm was affecting me. He was strong. His mesmer power swirled barely checked, at any moment I cared to test him.

Possibly he could awaken the susceptibility in women who were weaker than normal at attracting mesmers? Certainly we never lacked for food.

On the third morning, frustrated by being watched, I waited for him to go meet the woman. Then I walked quietly toward the car again.

Within twenty or so seconds I heard the crack and rustling sounds of him coming.

I stooped, waiting with a wry, resigned smile.

“Why?”

I shrugged. “Let’s talk. Okay?”

“Sure. Talk.”

Then he took my hand and walked me back toward the ruins and our cave-like room.

We couldn’t stay here.

He must see that?

I battered him with those words and explanations as we walked.

Once back at the room he pointed at the floor. “Sit.”

Then he turned and headed off again.

“We talking?” I sung out.

“Stay!”

The word was a command. I stayed. I fumed at his use of control, but I stayed as I had no choice.

He returned with chains in his hands. Many yards of it and I guessed it was something from the SUV for towing cars from bogs.

Grimm dumped them, tinkling, beside me. “Yours.”

“Bearing gifts today. Is it Christmas again so soon?” I joked, but the way he’d just grabbed my ankle was ominous.

I knew.

He meant to chain me.

This was getting worse.

“Don’t move.”

I managed to push at his shoulder, gingerly, as he circled my ankle with the chain then began to work at it, squeezing down, and making his muscles bulge...as if he was tightening something.

“No,” he said, matter-of-factly.

Crap.
I wrinkled my nose but stopped pushing.

When he was done I had a chain attached to my ankle and a heavy piece of wire knotting it closed. The rest of the chain, yards of it, clanked as he laid it out. Though he disappeared through the doorway, I could hear him shifting rocks.

I wanted to see, couldn’t. Logic told me he was fastening the other end to one of the blocks.

He returned with plates of food in his hands – the Thai omelets I’d eaten before and skewers of chicken.

Grimm sat and handed me a plate. “We can talk.”

How was I going to get us away now?

Perhaps his mind was the answer. If he wasn’t willing, he might keep me, us, here forever.

I poked at the cold omelet with the fork he’d given me. Then I checked the sturdiness of what fastened the chain on my ankle. Too much to ask that a fork could undo it?

Yes. The wire was damned thick.

“We could have talked before you did that.”

His brow lifted. “I don’t trust you. I don’t know if I can make you stay...forever.”

Now that was quite intelligent, if daunting. “Forever, here, would be bad.”

He shook his head and stuffed some omelet into his mouth.

We had fruit also, some sort of cooked rice that surely wouldn’t last in the heat. Day to day, we relied on his female
friends.

“No? Why is here better than going to the doctor? I want to fix you.”

And I knew the results wouldn’t be certain, but the more Grimm stopped me, the more I wanted to find him aid.

“Are you afraid?”

More raised brow, then, “Yes.”

“For you? I know it’s not –”

“No. For you. For you. Always for you. The doctor smells bad.”

“Uhhh. Okay.” Off with the fairies again. “You can’t smell someone you haven’t met.”

“Why should I go?”

Because you’re barely you anymore, Grimm. I’m losing you.
My own brows knitted as the worry percolated.
I want to save you, not that animal I see growing inside your head.

How crazy could he go before it was irrevocable?

I decided to try a different tack.

“How much can you remember of Australia? Do you remember the park? How you helped me get rid of Reuben?”

“Yes. I do.”

“You could think better then. I liked you more then. I want you back, Grimm.”

My eyes betrayed me and I began to weep. I dabbed my face with the back of my hand. My chest tightened and I distracted myself. I should leave the bandage off soon. The holes were small. The redness gone.

“You liked me more?” His breathing roughened. “I can think better than I say. I do remember.”

That was news. Welcome news. And yet he behaved differently too. Maybe he was ignorant of what he’d become? It was a puzzle. One I wanted gone.

“Do you remember vowing to help me when we were with Einar and Kaage?”

He nodded, his face stern, and I was sure those memories were bad ones...mostly.

“You vowed to help me, to be my knight in bloody armor, no matter what happened.”

“Yes. I am still your knight.”

Said so clearly too. I perked up, smiling, sitting straighter. “You helped me, saying that.”

“Good. Then you shot me.” He put his hand on his chest. “I know why. I killed your friend. I am sorry.”

“Yes.” I closed my eyes, reliving that flash of a scene. It was inevitable. Every single time. “Yes. I forgave you.”

“I remember.”

Sadly, I wasn’t sure he would remember it tomorrow.

Recovering from brain injuries was never simple. Even I knew that. We had to get rid of the cause and
then
see if he could recover. Now I knew why cancer sufferers went to Mexico for quack cures – because hope was an essential. No one could live without hope, or not for long.

And yet he wouldn’t leave.

I needed to keep him thinking, exercising his brain, until I found a way to get him to come with me.

“Can you tell me some stories? About your life?”

He looked thoughtful. “Not a creature was stirring, and all through the night...”

Christmas lyrics? I rummaged in my own memories for the rest. He had it back to front.

That seemed bad, though lyrics were not my strong point either.

“Do you remember the days travelling north, up the coast of Queensland?”

We went through memory after memory and I ended up with his head in my lap while we talked. Heads are damn heavy but I didn’t mind. Without the strange setting and the chain around my ankle, we might have been ordinary lovers. I ran my fingers over his face and through his hair – the curls were growing longer – and I imagined us as an old married couple doing this, laughing about how silly we had once been when young.

A cliché of sorts.

My heart ached with the possibilities.

The next morning he brought me little yellow flowers. Daisies of some variety, gathered from the forest. They lay scattered on his palm, crushed, reminding me of other times he’d given me flowers – at the park, after the sadistic chess game. It was Grimm’s signature move, his way of showing happiness or maybe love?

With the chain in hand, that he’d freed from beneath the huge block he used to anchor it, he went for a walk through the forest with me by his side, his poorly trained bitch.

I almost wondered if Tarzan would come swinging from the trees, or a witch with a gingerbread cottage. Now that would be something.

The chain looped and slithered along behind us, between us, like a metal snake that’d adopted us. Perhaps it would scare off the real snakes and the rats and whatever else rustled in the bushes.

A solution came to me. What if I escaped and brought the doctor to Grimm? If I did, I should contact Mavros too. He might have advice, ideas, provided he hadn’t given up on us. There was a thought. He might have given up. Grimm had punched him unconscious then we’d vanished. I wouldn’t blame him, though I really hoped not.

He was insufferably conceited and self-serving, but if he simply walked away from us, there’d be a hole left. I would feel his absence.

This was all so conjectural. Right now I had enough to worry about.