I step into the shower, wanting to scrub away the horrors I’ve seen and touched. My mind is on Quill, and I wonder what he’ll do next. He’s usually impossible to read, but now he doesn’t even understand himself.
Stepping out of the shower, I find him at the bathroom door. His gaze washes over my naked body, and he exhales coarsely.
“It never ends,” he says, walking away.
I follow him with only a towel wrapped around me. He opens the basement door until I touch his hand.
“We could chain you to the bed in your room. It’s quieter in there. No lying voices.”
“I don’t want you in my room.”
I cross my arms and frown up at him. Quill is behaving like a baby. While I feel pity for him never actually having a childhood, I also lack the patience to deal with his tantrum.
“I won’t go down there.”
Quill leans in and growls, “I can make you.”
“But you won’t. You want me to be in charge. You need me to chain you up and make you orgasm. So are we going to your room or are you handling this problem yourself?”
Frowning, Quill looks around, and I realize he’s never even masturbated before. He has no idea how to make himself feel better. The naughty part of my brain hopes once he settles down, I can teach him a lot of fun things.
Quill sighs full of defeat. The poor guy will have to fuck me in a bed. I want to laugh at his expression but restrain the urge so he won’t lose his already hair-trigger temper. He retrieves the chains from downstairs and brings them to his room.
A large, four-post bed rests in the corner of the room. I glance around at the décor and assume the owners of the real cabin chose the flowered wallpaper.
Nearby, Quill strips down. With every piece of clothing he removes, his expression becomes increasingly sullen, and the beast more intense. I lock him into the chains before my towel comes off.
Again he takes in the sight of me and seems more depressed than aroused. His body tells a different story. I stroke him quickly, licking at the head of his thick erection until he erupts into my mouth. He growls with the orgasm and hisses with pleasure when I suck at his softening flesh.
I crave to feel him inside me. The way he stretches and owns me is addictive. I’ve never enjoyed sex before. In the past, I orgasmed because my body felt things my heart never could. Now I have Quill.
Once he’s hard in my mouth, I pop him loose. I reach behind him and hold onto the bedpost. He watches me warily as I lower my breast to his lips.
“Suck, Quill.”
His mouth grudgingly opens for my nipple. He doesn’t care about my pleasure, which isn’t a surprise since he doesn’t care about his pleasure either. Quill endures sex while I ache for it.
Like a baby, he calms from the sucking motion. I have to wiggle free to force him to let go of the first nipple so I can switch. He frowns at me, irritated I took away his toy. Biting my nipple, he wants to punish me.
Tugging his head back, I kiss his forehead. “Be nice or I’ll leave you chained up in here.”
Growling, Quill yanks at the chains. I watch him struggle and hear him cursing my name under his breath.
“Do you want to suck?” I ask, tempting his lips with my hard nipple.
Relenting, he sucks the flesh into his mouth and relaxes. I run my fingers through his thick, brown hair. Closing my eyes, I enjoy the feel of his rough sucking. Between my legs, his cock searches for my pussy. I feel the tip leaking against my thigh, but I’m not ready. Quill is at my mercy, and I want to play a little more.
Tugging my nipple out of his mouth, I stand, so his mouth feels the heat of my pussy. I open the flesh between my legs and touch the swollen nub.
“This is my clit. If you lick it, I will cry out your name like you moan mine when I lick your dick. Will you help me cry out?”
Quill wants to glare at me, but his gaze latches onto the sight of my wet, pink flesh, and he can’t look away. He licks his lips, hungry for what I offer. I take a chance of offering my vulnerable clit to a still unsatisfied beast.
His tongue slides between my fleshy folds, drinking my juices. I hear him groan and strain for more. I brace myself against the wall, keeping my balance while he devours me long after I cry out his name.
When I take away his newest toy, he growls, “Bitch.”
“Patience,” I whisper, lowering myself onto his cock.
My body opens for him. His hips move instinctively, shoving upward to fill me completely. I cup his face and suck my juices from his lips. Between my legs, I clamp his erection tightly, making every thrust unbearable for him. Quill nips my bottom lip and won’t let go until he shudders from the first wave of his orgasm.
Quill groans and growls and mumbles my name. He calls me the devil while shoving himself deeper and seeking more pleasure. I watch him orgasm and enjoy how he smiles when the orgasm hits its peak.
Once he’s caught his breath, I lift my hips and find him with my mouth. Quill isn’t done. Not with one or two or ten orgasms. His body craves more until he can’t move any longer. Every time his cock softens, I stroke and tease it back into action. He asks for my pussy, wanting to taste me. I offer him whatever he desires. The look on his face when he’s relaxed is worth all of his sullen behavior.
I don’t know how long we’re together. The CD plays dozens of times without us pausing. Our bodies’ movements become leisurely. Gently rolling my hips, I wrap my arms around his neck. We stare at each other, feeling both connected and a million miles apart. Quill accepts his pleasure now, asking for what he wants. He even hates me less for giving him what he needs.
Carnal desire makes better sense to him now, but affection and love remain mysteries. I know as soon as his body is exhausted, he’ll want away from me.
So while Quill grudgingly offers his body to me, I don’t know if I’ll ever have a shot at owning his heart like he now owns mine.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Odessa
Later that night, scratching draws me to the window. I search for the cause, but a curtain of darkness prevents me from seeing anything past the porch. Glancing back at Quill, I wonder if he hears the noise too. He stares at the wall, lost in his thoughts.
I return my gaze to the night. The scratching might be the wolves or whatever creepy crawler climbed into my room. With Quill in no mood for fighting, I feel it’s my duty to remain on guard. A smile crosses my face when I imagine the idea of me battling the horrors prowling the night.
As if to prove my point, a creature’s eyes shine in the darkness. I step back as the woman leaps onto the porch and growls at me. Her face is a mask of white and ugly with broken angles. She’s less human than any of the Death Dealers I’ve seen in this place.
Quill appears next to me and rips the curtain closed. His anger nearly tears the rod free before the woman disappears behind the flowered fabric.
“Stop antagonizing her,” he demands.
“Who is she?”
“How would I know?”
“Will she break the window?” I ask, reaching for a nearby machete.
Quill grabs the weapon. “She won’t come inside.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know!” he yells, startling me a foot off of the ground. “I don’t know what the rules are here! I don’t know why we’re here or if we can leave! I don’t know why she can walk in the darkness while we can’t! I don’t know, Odessa! I don’t have the answers! I’m trapped here just like you and no one ever gave me an operating manual for this place!”
Quill strikes a fearsome figure standing over me with the machete in his hand. His raging eyes are nearly black while his entire body shakes with fear. Trapped in his head, he sees no escape from the weight of so many new emotions.
I don’t know if I should run for cover or hug him. With nowhere to hide in this place, I wrap my arms around his waist and wait for whatever response his furious mind provides.
“The confusion you feel is what everyone feels,
Quill. Once the newness wears off, you’ll handle the feelings better. I promise.”
“Your promises mean nothing.”
I look up to find him scowling at me. He’s considering whether his life would improve if he put the machete through me.
“You are not lost,” I whisper. “You know who you are. This place amplifies our feelings, but you can find peace as I have.”
“Your peace was stolen from me.”
“No, I have peace because you gave it to me. I’m not strong enough to take anything from you.”
“I want it back then,” he hisses.
“Isn’t there anything you like about feeling this way?” I ask, becoming very aware of the machete in his hand.
Quill shakes his head, but his eyes reveal uncertainty. Pleasure overwhelms him, driving him mad and tearing away his control. It’s still pleasure, though.
“I can love you, Quill,” I softly say, tightening my hold on him. “I haven’t loved anyone or anything since Athena died. I can love now, and I want to love you even when you act like a robot or when you hold a machete in your hand and feel malice in your heart.”
“I could kill you so easily.”
“Once you kill me, I’ll be gone forever. Are you ready to make a decision you must live with for so long?”
Quill closes his eyes and exhales softly. “I wish I hadn’t saved you.”
“I know, but you did. I can help you.”
“How?”
“When you’re in the storm, I can be your anchor like you’re mine. When the voices drive me crazy, or the storm makes me think I’d rather die than listen to another minute of thunder, I have you to bring me back. I can do that for you.”
“Wouldn’t it be best to die tonight and end our time in this prison?”
“What if we only end up in another prison? Besides, you didn’t give up when you were raised to feel nothing. When Chance killed everyone at the estate, you didn’t give up either. Why would you do so now?”
“I knew who I was then.”
“You’re still you. Look at how your solution to every problem is to kill it, and now you want to kill me. Even if you do, the feelings you’ve stirred up won’t go away.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I’m the catalyst for these feelings, but it could have as easily been Mary or another woman.”
Quill’s scowl darkens, and he pushes me away. “Now I know you’re lying. This couldn’t happen with anyone else. It had to be you, and you know that.”
“I don’t know anything.”
Standing in the kitchen, he sets the machete on the counter and exhales hard. “You’re the nightmare destroying me.”
I walk to the green chair and sit down. “Destroying each other could be what the Lost Highway has in mind for us. I finally forgive myself and love someone, only for that someone to destroy me. You feel for the first time, only to destroy me and end up miserable. We could be each other’s destruction.”
I consider the peace I’ve known since the night Quill lost his virginity. How I can now remember Athena without wanting to punish myself. Whatever this place intended, I’ve changed for the better.
Quill hasn’t destroyed me and neither has the Lost Highway.
“Your life before now wasn’t much to enjoy, Quill. You got up every day and cleared your traps. You hunted bad people, who hunted you. Then you came back here and waited to do it again the next day. How was that any better than how you feel now? Yes, you’re overwhelmed, but you’ve also enjoyed this new life.”
Quill stares at me from the kitchen. He hates me, but he’s also considering my words. This man craves strength. Wallowing in misery isn’t his way. He would never spend a lifetime punishing himself the way I did.
If my words offer Quill freedom from his unhappiness, he’ll accept them. If they don’t, he’ll follow another more permanent and bloody path.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Odessa
The people in the other cabin pack up their cars. They hug each other and allow the dog one final run around the grass before having him jump in the back of a truck. I watch them say goodbye and head back to their lives outside the woods.
“I guess their vacation is over,” I tell Quill, who sulks on the porch. “I wonder if they’re happy to go, or if they wish to remain there longer.”
“Who cares?”
“They’re us,” I say, watching the cars disappear into their woods and leave the cabin abandoned until the next vacationers arrive.
Quill feels defeated. While the sex provides him relief from the desire he loathes, my touch will never return him to the emotionless man he prefers.
“We can be happy here, or we can hope to return to our old lives,” I explain while sitting next to him on the wooden bench.
“We can’t return.”
“You don’t know that. It doesn’t matter. I’ve found peace here.”
“You had sex. Apparently, that’s all it takes to fix your problems.”
“I had plenty of sex before you, and I wasn’t fixed. So either this place is magical and healed me, or you have a mighty powerful penis.”
Quill gives me a side-glance and considers smiling. His bad mood wins, and we sit in silence for a long time.
“I wonder if we’re dead, and this is a kind of purgatory,” I say, thinking of the people from the other cabin again.
“I’m not dead.”
“Think about it. We both had near death experiences before we arrived here. Maybe we only thought we survived.”
When Quill says nothing, I continue, “John strangled me, and I died while imagining killing him. I’d always wondered about this place and sought out information about it. Then in death, I came here. Now I’m trapped until I die and go to wherever dead people go after they die again.”
“I’m not dead.”
“You said Chance thought he killed you.”
“I’m not dead.”
“Okay,” I say when he won’t budge. “In the end, it doesn’t matter if we died or not. We’re here now until we die. Well unless we’re here until we need to find peace from our lifetime struggles. In that case, I might be gone soon.”
Quill frowns at me. Perhaps, he’s bothered by the thought of me leaving.
“Wouldn’t you remember dying?” he asks.
“I remember thinking I was dying, and I killed John right afterward. Isn’t it possible I did die, and the experience of killing him was only my mind’s final electrical responses?”
“How did you drive here if you’re dead?”
“I don’t know. Maybe dead people drive to their fates.” When Quill gives me an odd look, I can’t help laughing. “Americans do love their cars.”
“If I’m dead, what’s the point?”
“What’s the point if you’re alive?”
“The point is to stay alive. If I’m already dead, I have no purpose.”
I realize I’ve talked him into another somber moment, so I rest my head against his arm. “I never belonged anywhere because I wouldn’t let myself. I feel like I belong here. Even if I die soon, I found my home here with you.”
Quill rolls his eyes at my comment. “You keep talking about dying. That’s why you’re a Death Dealer even if you can’t save yourself.”
“You could take me hunting and teach me. I’m a good student.”
“I don’t want to teach you.”
“Because it would take time away from you sulking?”
Quill makes a weird, growling sound. I know he’s angry and wants to intimidate me, but he makes the same noise when he has an orgasm. My mind is now on him naked, and he must realize this fact because he shakes his head.
Taking my hand in his, Quill studies it. “How can someone with a hand so small survive this place?”
“The first step is finding a big strong man to do the heavy lifting. Step two is to seduce him. The final step is to sit back and reap the rewards.”
I look up and find Quill gri
nning. Straddling him, I smile at his now annoyed face. “You smiled. You can’t take that back.”
Quill looks at the slip of space between our bodies and then back at me. “You do this on purpose.”
“Yes, it’s part of the seduction step. I could give you a quick handjob if the sex is simply too unbearable for you.”
Quill grits his teeth and stands up with me in his arms. “You’re becoming obnoxious.”
“We all have skills. Yours is killing. Mine is making you come apart. Just be happy my skill isn’t something stupid like twirling batons.”
Kicking the front door shut with his foot, Quill carries me to the back room where he dumps me on the bed. He yanks off his shirt, making clear a simple handjob won’t do. I remove my shirt too and then reach for him. Before my fingers can discover his rough chest hairs, he grabs the chains. Our gazes meet, and I know what he knows.
The beast inside him won’t be denied, and sex isn’t the only thing on its mind.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Quill
Odessa wants to learn to hunt so she can help me clear the traps. I only agree because I lack the will to say no. She holds all of the power now.
A simple look from Odessa sends me into animal arousal. With such control over me, she calls the shots, but soon I’ll rid myself of her and the gnawing desire inside me.
The machete looks too big for her small hands. She uses both of them to hold it. I watch her swing the weapon in smooth motions. She practices attacking threats by chopping into the trees near the cabin.
“Can I learn to shoot too?” she asks.
“Bullets are a rare commodity in the Lost Highway. I can’t waste any on teaching you.”
Odessa glances back at me over her shoulder and smiles in a way I feel down to my toes. She’s under my skin like a parasite, stealing my strength and common sense.
“Don’t sulk,” she teases before returning to hacking at the tree.
Lost Highway Page 8