by Snow, Nicole
She came back minutes later, a bulging satchel thrown over her shoulder, and her hand already in mine as she dragged me off into the woods.
We’re sitting in the clearing by the creek now, resting on a log, looking at each other in the moonlight.
It’s the same place we used to play as kids and she doesn’t even know it.
Through the trees here, not far away, there’s an old set of doors buried in the earth, covered in honeysuckle vines.
That’s the door where I’d escape into the trees to be with friends, before vanishing again.
I wonder if she even knows about it.
Then I wonder how one soft touch can hurt so fucking much. Rissa presses an alcohol-covered gauze pad to my jaw, wiping gently at my skin.
“Hold still,” she whispers.
“Fuck,” I hiss through my teeth, swearing softly under my breath.
Her smile strengthens, turns teasing.
“You big baby,” she murmurs, but there’s no sting to it. Just the warmth I crave so much while her fingers carefully tend my face. But her smile fades as she studies me, her eyes so clear in the moonlight. “Leo, be honest...is this because of me?”
The look she gives me tears my heart out; hook, line, and sinker.
“No.” I hate lying to her, even if it’s necessary. “Fuck no. Why would you even think that?”
She smiles weakly and sets the gauze down, replacing it with a tube of cream so cold it stings like frozen hell as she rubs it into my skin. “You work for a very powerful company that’s involved with my father. I’m his daughter, you’re a security guard, soooo...not exactly rocket science putting the pieces together.”
“The princess and the pauper.” I shrug, catching her wrist to stop her from playing nurse, and turn my head to kiss the heel of her palm. “It’s not that, sweetheart. I promise.”
There, at least, I’m telling the truth. Even if I can’t tell her I’m no ordinary security guard.
It’s not her fault. None of this shit. Not even what happens to me, seeing how she has zero influence over Galentron or her own vicious father.
I stop there. Can’t tell her anything else. The pain in my gut just churns, worse than the damage in my body.
And I tell myself it’s just to avoid more questions. That’s why I do something stupid.
I fucking kiss her.
I kiss her like mad, trying to lie to myself the entire time, but that frantic collision of lips and teeth and tongue speaks a thousand truths.
I kiss Rissa Bell because she’s balm on my soul.
There’s no pain my body can take that her touch can’t fix. The way she kisses back, all fire melted into a soft moan, might be magic.
There’s no one here but us and the stars and this psycho longing that’s been building inside me like an angry volcano for weeks. Every almost-kiss and every hasty touch that breaks off too soon, whenever we hear the creak of footsteps or realize just how little time we have left before we have to part, to keep our secret, to hide, has just made it worse.
I’ve wanted to claim every inch of her, starting with her mouth, consequences be damned. Out here, it’s the first time we’re truly alone.
There’s no one to hide from under the lush green canopy of the trees and open sky.
No one to get in the goddamned way.
No one to eavesdrop but the moon and stars.
Half-sighing, half-growling, I weave my fingers through her hair and coax her head back, begging her without words to open, to let me in, to melt real sweet for me.
My kiss stakes a claim I don’t quite have a right to.
For all the promises I’ve made, we haven’t been able to escape just yet. There’s one piece holding her back.
We need to get Deanna, too. Take her some place where no one will fault us and search up and down for stealing away her little sis.
It’s too soon to figure that out.
But here, now, my lips don’t care.
They need her bad.
And that animal need builds more and more with every whisper of her breaths, every hitching sound in the back of her throat, every hot little whimper as I tease my way deeper inside her and attack her tongue the same way I want to have the rest of her: with slow thrusts, slipping into the depths of her mouth to explore and fill and ask her if she’ll have me, if she’ll take me, if she could ever see herself with me in the most intimate, hungry, perfect way possible.
Good thing there’s an answer.
It comes in the seething clutch of her hands on my arms, “Leo” whispering against my lips. My name’s a question, an answer, and a plea.
Her perfect tits crush against my chest and abs as she digs herself into me, her nipples hard points against my shirt. I shudder with a hot bolt of desire that rips through me like a raging lion, roaring in my blood, nearly overwhelming this gentle moment with a demanding burst of pure lust.
I tear back from her lips, looking down at her with a growl hovering in the back of my throat.
Fuck.
She’s so tempting it’s painful, her lips still rose-red from my kiss and swollen. Her eyes are gleaming smoky and dark, her breaths panting, making the soft, pale curves of her tits push up against the sweeping neck of her blouse.
My dick is almost nuclear.
Feeling her pulse through her throat makes me want terrible things.
And that flush in her cheeks is an invitation.
I want this girl to blush for me, and only for me. Wear my jealous mark forever.
Clearly, I’m not thinking straight. But how the fuck could I when Clarissa torments my dick so hard it could pound nails?
“Rissa.” My fingers burn as I stroke her hair back, snarling at her warmth, the smoothness of her skin, the softness of her hair.
I don’t think she gets how someone so delicate, so beautiful, so terribly sweet sets me on fire. I want to fuck this girl into oblivion, take her cherry, and ruin her for any other man. I want her fucking mine.
She’s my opposite.
Where I’m rough and crude and masculine, she’s this gorgeous thing dripping with a sexuality I don’t think she even notices. It’s innocent and knowing, wise and untried, inviting and unconscious.
It’s also wreaking hell on my cock and my common sense.
I swallow another growl, twining her hair around my fingers. “I need you,” I rasp out, lust making my voice thick. “Need to be with you, Rissa, if you want me. If you’ll have me.”
There’s not even a flicker of doubt. No hesitation.
Just her fingers in my scruff, tracing my jaw, slim and hot and nimble.
“Leo,” she whispers again, gasping my name as she pushes herself up and seals her mouth to mine, then slips her plush, delicious body into my lap.
Any ideas I had about control are gone in a flash.
I can’t control shit.
Not when her dress is so short and her thighs are so full and lush, and she’s straddling me.
Not when I can feel just how thin her little panties are as she comes down against me, pressing our bodies together till we’re just burning flesh and fabric that might as well not be there.
Not when it’s her wetness and heat so naked against my skin.
She wants me.
This beautiful fucking woman wants me, and I’ll explode if I can’t have her right the hell now.
You’d think our first time would be gentle and slow.
But there’s this passion in Rissa, this wild animalism I never expected. She bites my mouth with heat so fierce I have to bite her back, tumbling her down into the grass and leaves, ripping at her dress. The fabric shreds under me and all that delectable pale flesh spills out for my greedy eyes and mauling touch.
I’ve never seen a woman like her.
The way her hips curve out, so thick and lush, from a high, tiny waist that swells out into breasts that fill my hands to overflowing.
Her thick, pink nipples are begging for my mouth. I nip and suck and
bite and toy till they’re swollen, nearly red, and she’s fisting her fingers in my hair, moaning my name and squirming under me like she can’t stand another minute of it.
She’s like this primordial goddess, naked against the leaves with her mahogany hair everywhere in tangles and her eyes this vivid jade green.
It’s like she was made to give life.
And she brings my soul to heaven as I grip her soft, yielding thighs, spread her legs, and bury my face in her pussy with a ravenous hunger.
She’s so wet. Fuck, it’s hot, in the moonlight I can see her glistening, and when I rake my tongue over her sweet cunt she nearly screams.
Her fingers fist my hair as I lap at her like mad and she’s still dripping, still pouring, still turning me on so much I’m about to bust through my jeans.
She tastes so damn good I can’t stand it. I shudder as I probe my tongue deeper inside her.
I need her ready. I need her willing. I need her open and soft and ready to take me.
Because I’m not a small man.
What I’m packing will make her scream.
And while there’s a wicked part of me burning with the thought of completely tearing her open and making her mine, I want her to enjoy every second.
I want her to want it—and me—again. I want her addicted when she comes.
Yeah, there’ll be pain. I can’t help that. Not when I am what I am; not when it’s her first time.
But I can at least make the pain sweet, leave her so sensitive she can’t sort it from pleasure.
So I use my tongue. I use my fingers. I explore her depths, and she’s so molten inside I can already tell how good she’ll feel wrapped around my cock, writhing all over.
I play with her pussy till she’s wrung out, arching and convulsing and practically struggling, spilling more sweet wetness into my palm as I slip my fingers in and out of her again and again and again.
Every time I think I should stop, she clamps her knees shut, her thighs folding around my hand and wrist, trapping me inside her.
Fuck, she’s so sensuous.
So needy.
So completely given over to the wild abandon of sex without shame, without hesitation.
It’s beautiful. Fucking intoxicating to be wanted by this woman this much.
Can’t stand it anymore.
I go still, breathing hard, staring down at her through narrowed eyes. She’s such a perfect mess, her thighs streaked and gleaming, her folds pink and swollen from my thrusting fingers and sucking lips, her expression so blissfully tortured.
I want too much: to ravage her, ruin her, keep her, cherish her, protect her, break her.
No one ever said I wasn’t an animal.
The beast in me has full control now as I drag my jeans open and bare my cock. It hurts when I fist it, my lust throbbing hot and painful, the cool night air against my skin, the tip beaded wet with pre-come.
It makes me hiss through my teeth. I catch its weight in my hand to steady its hungry pulse, my own palm almost too much to bear.
I half expect her to flinch when she sees me.
When she remembers I’m over six and a half feet tall and the rest of me matches, and she’s not a tiny woman but next to me?
She’s small. Delicate.
I need to ease her into this.
But Rissa doesn’t hesitate.
Not even for a second as she reaches out to touch me with soft fingers that feather over my cock and nearly undo me then and there. My balls burn.
Falling forward with a groan, I brace my hands on her sides, my hips jerking as she explores me, electrifies me, traces fire over my skin with slow, sweet touches. They shape my cock to the print of her palm, sensitive and so fucking hot.
She guides me down to her. Spreads her thighs around my hips, and presses the head of my cock to her slick, swollen folds.
“Fuck!” I gasp.
And it’s the last coherent word I’ve got in me before I snap.
My kiss comes like wildfire with teeth.
I dig my fingers into her hips, pulling her into me.
And I just barely remember to fumble for the condom I’ve kept hopefully in my back pocket for weeks before heat meets heat and I give in to the irresistible gravity of Rissa.
There’s a frozen second as I poise there, caught on the edge, the tip of my cock just barely inside her.
Then she cries out, arches her back, wraps her arms around me, locks her thighs around my hips again, and pulls me in.
She’s. Fucking. Tight.
Hotter than sin. And clutching at me like she never wants to let go. Pleasure hits so deep in every wild, shaking thrust, it leaves me dizzy.
My hips piston-slam hers, fucking her right through the discomfort, kindling her pleasure and crashing her headfirst into orgasm.
I love how she whimpers. How my name becomes like music and a curse, the raw insanity of an angel losing herself on every churning inch of my dick owning her depths.
She finds my rhythm after she comes, lifts herself up to crash into me, to meet me with a wildness that’s purely us.
Our kisses turn savage. Our sex, even more so, and I’m no longer worried about hurting her when her nails scratch my neck and her heels dig into my ass.
Shit, I’m no longer scared of anything.
Rissa accepts me like no other human being I’ve met, welcoming me with her body, her voice, her begging, grasping hands.
And as I surge deeper, harder, riding the high of a pleasure so stark it’s pure, sugar rush agony, I fucking know. I know right before the fire in my balls rips up my cock and electrifies my spine, bathing my brain in pure caveman heat.
She’s with me. She’s already mine. And I’m so hers, I can’t imagine being anything else.
* * *
Present
The memory leaves my mouth dry, my head spinning, as the noise of someone screaming from the plaza drags me back to the present.
Back to reality, where I find Rissa still staring at me.
Shit. I realize I’m gawking at her, too, and holding on tight. We need to get out of here.
I swallow, starting to murmur an apology, but I can’t read her expression anymore.
So I shut up.
Then I let her go, feeling the sensation of her warm flesh soaking through her clothing and into my palms, before I grip the edge of the truck bed and vault over it. When I land, the truck bounces hard on its tires, dipping, and Gray gives me the evil eye.
“Would you mind going easy on my suspension? I already lost one truck this year,” he says, moving past with the speed that’s as much Gray as his icy wit, letting himself into the driver seat.
“Down,” he orders, slamming the door and starting the engine.
I oblige, dropping to lie flat in the truck bed, even though it’s almost not long enough for me.
Clarissa does, too. I want to tell her she doesn’t have to.
She’s safe.
It’s me they’d come after. Me they’d hunt us for. But my damn lips won’t move.
Not when it’s been so long since we laid together, face-to-face, eye to eye. Even if it’s nothing like before, a strange part of me wants to hold on to this as long as I can.
So I let silence do the talking.
I drink my fill of Clarissa Bell quietly, taking her in with a greedy gaze, while Doc’s truck goes rolling out of the plaza and away from Fuchsia’s storm.
* * *
No question, The Menagerie is the safest place for us right now.
At Gray’s vet practice we’re barely out in the open for two seconds before he ushers us in through the back entrance, and then into a room that’s overflowing with spacious kennels, the scent of clean fur, the quiet sounds of curious dogs and cats and a few other things that probably aren’t legal to keep as pets.
I don’t expect him to leave us alone for long.
It’s just me, her, and a little boy who’s already over his fear. He’s crouched in front of a kennel,
poking his fingers in to let a ragdoll cat with smoky-colored fur sniff and nuzzle at his fingers.
Meaning it’s really just me and Clarissa right now.
Staring. I can’t stop myself from looking at the scar on her cheek.
I remember it as a blood-wound scratched down her face, right after that hateful demon of a man rammed a vase against her skull hard enough to shatter the ceramic.
I don’t realize my hand is moving till I feel the softness of her skin, warm and smooth even through the insulating layers of my gloves. She’s so damn alive.
So real.
I still feel like a ghost, a phantom haunting these hills, a life written in rumors.
The instant we come into contact, though, her eyes widen, her gasp slips out, and she stares at me, holding still, trembling.
But she doesn’t pull back, even as I slowly draw my finger down the line of the scar, tracing the way it cuts a ferocious mark into her skin, a single small blemish that only makes her beauty more goddamn radiant. It’s the contrast, I think.
If only my scars were the same.
When she starts to reach for me, a whisper of “Leo” on her lips, her fingers skating dangerously close to my face mask, I come back to earth.
“Don’t.” I jerk back, growling harsher than I intend, breathing ragged.
I can’t help myself.
I can’t let her see how fucking disfigured I am.
Watching me with stricken eyes, she lets her hand fall.
That terrible silence builds between us again, a silence made up of years and distance and so many unanswered questions. I want to ask all the shit I’ve got no right to.
Ask her about the boy.
Ask her why she ran.
Ask her if what we had was ever real.
If she really loved me, if she held on to that feeling the way I’ve held on to her.
But I don’t get the chance when the door flies open.
Even though we’re standing more than a foot apart, we both break away, putting more distance between us, retreating to opposite sides of the room as Doc and Ember step in.