Conjuring Darkness

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Conjuring Darkness Page 11

by Melanie James


  Ryan held on to her hips and helped guide her movements. She arched her back and took him even deeper. Her heart pounded, her blood seemed to boil in her veins. She felt like her skin was too tight. Her body started to shake as it seemed to be racing toward something that she couldn’t identify. “That’s it Lex, let go baby,” Ryan said as he started to massage her swollen nub.

  “Oh, God Ryan, I—I—,” She cried as another orgasm tore through her. Her body shivered with pleasure. Her breaths were shallow as the waves of ecstasy continued to wash over her. Ryan quickly rolled her over, their bodies never losing the intimate connection. He wasn’t about to give her time to recover before her next orgasm hit.

  Just when she thought life couldn’t get any better, Ryan’s expert skills sent her flying to another high. She couldn’t comprehend how this much pleasure could be possible. Her mind struggled to form a single coherent thought. She gave up trying as her moans became louder. Lexi felt wicked beneath him. Her body was truly alive for the first time, ever.

  She wrapped her legs around his waist, locking her heels. Her fingers dug deep into his back, as she bit and nipped at his shoulder, neck, and lips. Lexi felt like an untamed beast and she loved every second of it. She would probably be embarrassed by her behavior later, but for now, all she wanted to do was enjoy the ride.

  Their fire burnt late into the night, until they slowed and then finally ended in an intimate embrace. Lexi laid her head on Ryan’s chest and listened to the beats of his heart. Ryan ran his hand across Lexi’s back and up the nape of her neck. As he ran his fingers through her hair, he broke the comfortable silence.

  “This is going to sound kind of crazy for me to say but, we’ve really only known each other a short while—and I didn’t have any intention of this happening. I know that I’ve never enjoyed being around anyone so much or wanted someone so much, until I met you, Lex. It’s like we’re two pieces of a jigsaw puzzle that just happened to come together, and we fit perfectly.”

  Lexi looked up at him and her eyes began to water. “I feel the same way, Ryan. I’ve never felt any of this, emotionally or physically. Not because I didn’t want to, but because I never let myself. I guess in most stories, this is the time when we are supposed to make some sort of promise or vow. We’ve only just met. Maybe it’s because we’ve spent so much time together sharing everything, or maybe there is some magic out there. All I know is that when I’m with you, I feel truly alive. I’m not going to ask you to make any promises, just kiss me again like you did before.”

  Ryan leaned down and cradled her head with his hands as their lips met. “I think I like this kind of magic.”

  Buddy lumbered through the door and climbed onto the bed amid protests from both Lexi and Ryan. “I am pretty sure you actually urged Buddy to come over and slobber on me earlier.”

  “He came up with that idea all on his own! Pretty smart dog, isn’t he?”

  “Well, that certainly is a novel move, but I can’t say the end result was guaranteed! Just so you know, you didn’t need Buddy to seduce me...not at all.”

  Lexi and Ryan had finally succumbed to a deep slumber. It seemed like only minutes had passed before Ryan was jolted from his sleep by a rapid series of snapping noises. The sounds were accompanied by bright flashes that came from the jungle behind the house. Ryan put an arm around Lexi and forcefully dragged her off of the mattress. He was alert and grabbed an AK-47 that he kept strapped to the sideboard of his bed frame. Lexi was bewildered and her head was still clouded from sleep. “What? What is it?”

  “The perimeter trip wires are going off.” More snaps and light switches tripped at random places around the jungle. “Stay down!” He grabbed a laptop from a table near the bed. They watched the screen display half a dozen cameras Ryan had set up in the surrounding forest. Nothing moved. Ryan skipped back through the recorded video and looked for anything that could have set off the alarm.

  “What do you see?”

  “Nothing. Wait. Something is there and there! No way in hell! It was here and almost simultaneously way over on the other side!” Ryan pointed to the blurry image of what appeared to be a human shape that was nearly twenty feet off the ground. It appeared on two separate camera images that were about four hundred yards apart, but somehow each camera recorded the same creature within only seconds of each other. He switched the video feed to the cameras located on the exterior of the house. They waited quietly on the floor next the bed. Buddy had jumped off the foot of the bed and covered Lexi in a protective blanket.

  They could hear the loud snaps and crashes of large tree branches being broken. “Something is coming, hear that? It’s getting closer.”

  Ryan pulled the bolt back on his rifle and let it slam forward to load a round in the chamber. The usual background noise of the nighttime jungle had ceased and all that could be heard was the relentless cracking. “What the hell is that?” Ryan couldn’t fathom how any human or animal could cause such damage.

  They heard a loud scream. A terrible scream that was part howl, but with the deep and incredible roar of a lion. Lexi began to shake as fear penetrated her pounding heart. There was a crash against the house and it vibrated with the concussion. The video feed from the cameras had gone dead. Ryan crawled to the bedroom door and looked for any sign of movement.

  After an hour had gone by and everything quieted down, Ryan convinced Lexi it was probably just a gale force wind that blew in from the sea. He told her that one must have accompanied the stormy weather and had knocked down some trees as it had done before. Once he was able to calm her, they climbed back in bed. Lexi fell asleep with Buddy tight against her. Ryan, however, stayed wide awake.

  Shortly after Lexi fell asleep, there was a loud knock at the front door. It was still dark when Ryan looked at the clock and saw that is was nearly four in the morning. He grabbed his rifle and held a finger to his mouth, telling Buddy “Shush, quiet. Stay.” He carefully walked out to the living room, closing the bedroom door behind him. Before answering the knock he strategically walked to the other side of the living room, so that if it was an intruder, any attack would be in the opposite direction of where Lexi peacefully slept.

  “Who is it?” He asked the unknown presence.

  A voice he recognized answered. It was an elderly man from the native tribe, who lived several miles inland from the little fishing village nearby. He was once the shaman of his people, and he could sometimes be found out on a spiritual journey as he followed his hallucinations through the jungle. He begged to be let in.

  Ryan had heard the rumors from the locals, but he figured the old man was harmless. The villagers had shunned the old shaman and forced him to live alone in the forest. They said that he had been possessed by an evil spirit. Ryan thought that if he had exhibiting some sort of bizarre behavior, it was more likely the repeated doses of psychedelic concoctions had taken their toll on the shaman’s sanity.

  Ryan opened the door and the old man walked in. He was small and dark skinned. He wore only the traditional loincloth that had once been typical of the natives of the region. His head, arms, and chest were smeared with something red. Ryan looked back to be sure that the bedroom door was still closed with Buddy behind it, protecting Lexi. Ryan slowly stepped backward to let the strange man walk in. “Stop right there. What’s wrong? Do you need help?” The man didn’t answer. He stood, slouched in silence. “Hey! You! What’s wrong?” The man took a step closer, but never looked up. Suddenly, with the quickness of a pouncing jaguar the man raised his head and jumped into the air toward Ryan. He opened his mouth and Ryan realized instantly that each one of the man’s teeth had been filed down into pointed fangs.

  His insanely vicious attack was thwarted when Ryan quickly swung the butt of his rifle upwards with all of his strength. The stock connected under the attacker’s jaw with a sickening smack that knocked the airborne madman to the ground. The blow had forced the intruder to crawl away back to the door.

  A group of a dozen me
n from the tribe had been tracking the crazed shaman. They had just started to gather at Ryan’s door when their wounded prey crawled through the door. Lexi was woken by the commotion and now peered out of the bedroom door as Buddy blocked her from stepping out into the living room.

  “Ryan, what happened?” She looked around and nervously asked.

  “Looks like we found out who was tripping those wires earlier. Some crazy man from the tribe. Let me find out what the story is.”

  Ryan stepped out onto the deck, where the posse had tied up the shaman and were preparing to carry him away. Their Spanish was often mixed with their native language and Ryan struggled to comprehend what they told him. In the last month, three people had gone missing from the village. Each had been dragged out into the jungle during the night. They feared it was a jaguar that had found a taste for human flesh, but they couldn’t find any tracks or sign.

  They posted guards every night after the disappearances and on this night, they were alerted by the screams of a woman. Somehow, the attacker had slipped into the village and stolen her away. They spotted her corpse in a tree, with the blood soaked shaman ripping her flesh away with his monstrous teeth. He was quickly lost in the jungle. Once he was spotted and after a long search, they tracked him to Ryan’s house.

  The story they told Ryan ran through his mind.

  What the hell do they mean? He’s not crazy or possessed? I think they were trying to say he was a slave or a captive of an evil spirit. What was the word they used...servant. A servant for the demon...and under its spell. The look on those guys faces, they were terrified, absolutely terrified of the shaman. I still don’t know why they kept pointing around in the sky and talking about the demon. At least they got that nutcase. I have a feeling that whatever they do to him is going to be pretty bad, and I don’t even want to know about it.

  He watched the party walk away down the beach with the shaman tied to a pole that hung between the shoulders of two men as if they had just bagged a wild boar. He went back in and smiled at Lexi. “Well that worked out pretty well. I guess some crazy man was on the loose and there was a posse looking for him. He came here and I booted him out the door right into their laps. That solves the mystery of our scare earlier.” Ryan looked around the room so he didn’t have to face Lexi because he knew he was a terrible liar.

  “What about that creepy thing on the video? What was that?”

  “Probably monkeys that got woken up by the wind and were jumping between the trees scared as hell. I wouldn’t worry a bit.” This time Ryan kept his eyes on Buddy, because he worried that Lexi would easily spot the worrisome look he still had. He justified his lie by telling himself there was no need to put Lexi in a panic when there seemed to be no more imminent threat.

  The three of them crawled into the bed together and once again drifted toward sleep. It was mid-morning when Ryan’s phone rang. He scrambled over the top of Lexi to grab it. He remained in place, casually lounging on her as he answered the call. When the call disconnected, he placed the phone back on the table before rolling back to his side of the bed.

  “We will leave this afternoon. A helicopter will be here at three to take us to a private runway where we’ll catch a plane to Panama and take a charter flight to Israel. We’ll take Buddy down to the fishing village in a bit. He’ll enjoy visiting with friends until we...I mean, until I get back.”

  Lexi had just starting to process what Ryan had said. What about after this trip? Will it be a—we? I sure hope so, but I have to remember what Marcie said. I can’t let myself get too attached to him, but what if I already am?

  Chapter Eight

  The long trip to Tel Aviv seemed much shorter because of the time Lexi and Ryan had spent talking with one another. They enjoyed each other’s company and conversations so much that they had to remind themselves to get some sleep on the way. All of the little details of their personalities meshed together perfectly on the flight.

  The plane was a passenger jet that had been converted to carry cargo, with the exception of a few extra seats. Other than the flight crew, Ryan and Lexi enjoyed complete privacy to not only enjoy talking, but to continue their intimate adventures.

  Lexi smiled and looked out the window. She watched the tops of thunderstorms gathering. The sky seemed like it was wrapped in an endless sunset. The tops of thunderheads mushroomed upwards into beautiful pink and orange clouds.

  She drifted off to sleep and was haunted by another troubling dream. The nightmare seemed to drift up from the shadowy depths of her mind. She felt like she was flying through a forest that was flooded with pale light from the fullness of the moon. Shades of deep blue and black filled the air as she soared through the shadowy spaces between large cedar trees.

  She came to a halt, hovering above a naked woman sitting alone in the dense forest. The woman spoke in strange words. Lexi strained to listen to what the woman said, but found she couldn’t understand the language. Lexi tried to call out to the woman, but her voice was frozen by the paralysis of dreams. She couldn’t make a sound.

  The naked woman looked up. Lexi silently screamed at the sight of the hideous face. Its sunken cheeks and hollow eyes gazed up at her. The woman turned away and then looked up once again. This time, the face smiled at her and Lexi gasped as it was a face that she immediately recognized. It was the smiling face of her best friend Marcie. Lexi woke with a start and quickly jumped out of her seat, shocked by the dream.

  Ryan took her hand as he tried to comfort her. “You sure do dream a lot. Nightmares?”

  “Yeah, ever since the night before I left Montana, it seems like I’ve had very weird dreams. I think it must have something to do with everything that’s going on. Plus, I seem to have an owl problem.”

  “An owl problem?” Ryan asked bewildered.

  “Well, the night before that letter came I had this huge horned owl sitting in a tree outside of my bedroom window. It came again the next night and even when I stayed the night in Arlington, there was a great horned owl outside of the window. When we were at your place, I didn’t see one, but I could swear I heard it out there in the middle of the night. Those weren’t dreams, but they sure seem like a weird coincidence. I’m sure they have me spooked into making my dreams a little scary. This last one seemed like I was flying—like an owl and then I saw someone sitting in the woods. I don’t know, I think it’s just stress.”

  “Well that explains the reaction you had when I told you about the owl that I encountered with the African voodoo doctor. I was wondering why that part of the story bothered you so much.”

  She was glad to be awake now, and to have Ryan there with her. The supernatural aura of her dream was still buzzing in her mind and she felt strangely erotic. It was as if the dream wiped away her inhibitions. An idea that was more of an impulse pushed her into action. Lexi dropped down to her knees.

  “There is something I want...”

  “What’s that, Lex?”

  “I want to take you in my mouth. I want to taste you.”

  She lifted his shirt, exposing his toned hard abs. She kissed a soft trail down Ryan’s waist and unzipped his pants.

  I can’t believe I am going to do this. What has gotten in to me? She thought.

  His hard shaft sprung free from its confines. Lexi grasped it with her hand and stroked him slowly. Her tongue traveled up and down his length. When she reached the tip, she ran her tongue around it, exploring its shape and the smoothness of the skin. She parted her lips and did her best to take his large cock deep into her mouth.

  She felt compelled to show him how much she loved having him with her, and that she wasn’t afraid to take advantage of him, just a little. His hands twisted through her hair as her head slid up and down, slowly at first before she sucked him faster. Her palm wrapped tight around his rod and joined in unison with her mouth. She quickened her pace to heighten Ryan’s pleasure.

  Lexi continued to vary her technique. She loved the ecstasy that rolled in waves over his
hard body. She could tell he was holding back his release, trying to prolong the enjoyment. Lexi never thought such an act could turn her on so much, but it did. She watched his body tighten as his climax approached. She felt his cock throbbing in her mouth, begging for release.

  “Lex. Oh God, baby!” Ryan cried out. Lexi devoured him aggressively. She wanted him to let go of any control that he was trying to maintain. Ryan’s body arched and she could feel his climax shooting into her mouth. He trembled with the aftershocks from his release as Lexi continued her sensual assault. Giving Ryan that much pleasure made her feel wild, and she didn’t want to stop.

  Ryan pulled her off of her knees and kissed her neck softly. “Wow Lex—that was incredible and completely unexpected.”

  “I know I’m probably not that good at it, seeing as you are the only guy I’ve ever been with, but I hope you don’t mind. It’s something I wanted to do, and to be honest, it really turns me on.”

  Ryan chuckled, “No Lex, I don’t mind at all, in fact—any time you want it, feel free. And for the record, you are absolutely amazing.”

  She had allowed herself to let go. Lexi let her new bond with Ryan take away any resistance she had to opening her heart to him. She knew she could only feel that way under the spell of love. What came over me? What does he think I’m really like now? I can’t help myself. I‘m falling in love with him, I know it.

  Their flight touched down at Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv, Israel. Once they had finally stopped at the cargo terminal, two men boarded the plane. The handshakes and hugs with Ryan told Lexi that they were old friends reunited. They all walked over to Lexi to be introduced. Ryan put one arm over her shoulder.

  “Guys, this is my girlfriend, Lexi. Lexi Salenko.”

 

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