SINS of the Rex Book 2

by Emma Slate

  We found a clearing not too far from the house with a few smooth gray boulders. I sat on one and Sasha sat next to me, close enough that I could feel the heat of him. It was comforting.

  “Do you have nightmares?” I asked him.

  “Every now and again. You?”

  I nodded. “Frequently. And there’s been more of them ever since Hawk…”

  Disappeared, I didn’t say. I didn’t have to.

  “Campbell? Does he know about your nightmares?”

  “Yes.”

  “In depth?” he wondered.

  “No. He knows what I dream about, but I never describe in detail.”

  “Because you’re protecting him—still. After all this time.”

  “My dreams remind him that he wasn’t able to protect me,” I admitted.

  “So you carry the burden yourself.”

  “Maybe,” I said with a shrug.

  “What are your dreams about? Igor? Vlad?”

  I nodded. “And blood. One or both of them dying in front of me.”

  “And?”

  How did he know there was more? And how was I supposed to admit how depraved my subconscious could be? More often than not, I dreamt of both of them. Naked. Together. Surrounding me. Their hands on me. In me. Painting my skin with their blood. I sometimes woke up with a scream of rapture lodged in my throat, my body wracked with tremors of an orgasm I had in sleep.

  Sasha looked at me and he knew. He knew the things I couldn’t find a way to admit even to my husband. As much as I loved Flynn, as much as he loved me, I worried he wouldn’t understand.

  The wind picked up and I shivered, feeling an icy chill of foreboding skimming down my spine. Maybe it was the fingers of my ghosts, wanting to remind me that they’d always haunt me.

  “Let’s go back,” Sasha suggested, reaching out a hand to me.

  I took it, his palm warm against mine. And just like that, my ghosts were banished. For the moment.

  I crept back into the bedroom feeling like a teenager sneaking into the house past curfew. Quickly stripping out my clothes, I shivered. I scooted under the covers, seeking his warmth.

  “Why?” he asked quietly.

  I started, though I shouldn’t have been surprised. I forced myself to calm, to melt against him, but Flynn remained unyielding, his body taut.

  “I don’t know,” I said.

  “That’s no longer a good enough answer, Barrett.” He rolled over onto his back, his face turned to the ceiling. “What can you tell him that you can’t possibly say to me?”

  “I can’t hurt him with the truth,” I said, trying to explain. “Because the biggest truth is I don’t love him. So whatever I say is nothing as bad as that.”

  “I hate that he gives you something I can’t. You’re my wife. I’m your husband.”

  The words I’d been holding in since Hawk disappeared came from deep within, escaping the confines of my throat, flapping their wings and soaring between us. “I blame you. For Hawk.”

  “I know,” he said quietly. “I blame me for Hawk, too.”

  “I’m scared we won’t find him. And if we don’t find him, I don’t know how I’m supposed to forgive you.”

  Flynn didn’t reply or touch me. The distance between us we hadn’t addressed until now yawned before us like a chasm. I felt it all the way in my heart.

  “We’ve always been able to find our way back to each other,” he said.

  “Through intimacy. Through sex.”

  “Which we haven’t been able to have because your body isn’t healed. We have to find another way, Barrett. I can’t lose you.”

  “What if I’m already lost?”

  Flynn turned to look at me, his face harsh in the moonlight, like the wild beauty surrounding us. “If you’re lost, then I’ll find you.”

  “I’m not strong enough to survive losing him, Flynn.”

  “We haven’t lost him yet. There’s still hope.”

  I smiled at him, but it was sad.

  He came to me, settling on top of me so we were skin to skin, heart to heart. “I’ll be strong enough for both of us. Always.”

  My hands plowed through his hair and I brought his head close to my lips. “I love you.”

  I hoped it was enough.

  At dawn, Flynn kissed me goodbye. Though I was half asleep, I could still detect the meaning of the look in his eyes. Resolute, fierce, and full of promise. Promise that he’d find our son. After Hawk was safe, Flynn and I could have a sensual reunion that recommitted who we were and what we meant to each other.

  I think what I loved most about Flynn was that he was strong when I couldn’t be.

  I fell back asleep with a smile on my face, knowing that Flynn would never let me go, no matter what happened.

  My alarm went off at ten. I hadn’t set my alarm in weeks, but today I had an appointment. I got dressed, grabbed my phone and purse and was out the door. The drive to Inverness took a little under an hour, but like all doctor’s offices, they were running behind.

  I started to flip through a magazine, but my cell phone rang. Not wanting to be one of those people that disturbed others, I set down the magazine and exited the waiting room.

  It was Flynn calling to tell me that he and Sasha were settling in at Lord Arlington’s townhouse. Lord Arlington had given them use of it while he’d taken his family to visit the grandparents.

  “I’ll try to check in every night,” Flynn said.

  “But if I don’t hear from you, you’re underground,” I finished for him. I smiled even though he couldn’t see me. “I know the drill.”

  “Aye, you do,” he said. I could hear his own smile. “I love you, hen.”

  “I love you.”

  We hung up and then I went back into the waiting room just as a blonde plump nurse called out, “Mrs. Campbell?” She looked around and then smiled when I nodded.

  I followed her to one of the exam rooms, changed into a gown while she asked me some questions. I hopped up onto the exam table and waited for the doctor. Luckily, I didn’t have to wait long and we got right to the stirrups.

  “I realize it’s two weeks earlier than you’d normally see me,” I said as she began her exam.

  “Anywhere between four to six weeks is fine,” she assured me. “Some women heal faster than others. Some slower. Go with what your body tells you.”

  “My body is telling me I really want to have sex with my husband.”

  She let out a chuckle. “You can sit up now, I’m done.”

  “So?” I asked, reaching for my underwear.

  “Everything looks good.”

  “Really? You’re giving me the green light?”

  “All systems are a go,” she said with a laugh.

  Boy, was she right.

  She gave me some tips and some things to watch out for the first few times Flynn and I were intimate. “Things have changed, so it might be a little different. Don’t sweat it, okay?”

  I nodded, already lost in thoughts of seducing Flynn the moment I saw him.

  “Mrs. Campbell?” the doctor asked.

  “Sorry, what?” I asked, realizing she had still been talking and that I’d tuned her out.

  She smiled. “I asked about your son. How is he?”

  I swallowed and forced a smile of my own. “He’s perfect.”

  Chapter 23

  “Any word from Ramsey?” I asked Duncan that night at dinner.

  The hounds were at my feet, begging for scraps which I refused to feed them. Betty was at my feet too, but she wasn’t a beggar—she knew better.

  “Radio silence,” Duncan said, passing me the mashed potatoes.

  “And Elliot?” Ash asked. “I’m still weirded out that we have a prisoner downstairs in our dungeon.”

  “That might be something you might have to get used to. It could become a regular occurrence,” Duncan said.

  Ash stopped her fork from going into her mouth. “Seriously?” She looked between us for confirmation.<
br />
  “You know our lives aren’t like others,” Duncan said.

  She glowered. “I’m aware.”

  “Are you?”

  “You have no idea what it’s been like for me,” Ash hissed.

  “Because you refuse to tell me!” Duncan bellowed back. “I ask you to talk to me and you shut down completely!”

  Apparently a fight had been brewing between them for a good long while and now it was ready to explode. All over the dinner table. Standing up, I picked up my plate and quietly backed out of the room, leaving them to it. I could hear them yelling even as I went into the sitting room. Yelling turned into breaking plates, and then it was quiet.

  I had a pretty good idea of what was occurring and I didn’t want to be in the house any longer. I quickly bundled up and escaped to the outdoors.

  Tensions were high, the unknowns piling up. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that Ash wasn’t cut out for this kind of life. She’d almost lost Duncan—and their fight was because she realized she could lose him at any time. Maybe she could’ve wrapped her mind around it except it all kept escalating. Malcolm was dead and Hawk had been kidnapped. No one was safe, and it was finally hitting Ash.

  Hawk had been gone two weeks. My heart wouldn’t survive this. I missed Flynn and I wanted to talk to him. As I walked around the grounds of Duncan’s estate, I called my husband. I wasn’t surprised when he didn’t pick up. Hanging up with a sigh, I knew there was nothing to do but wait. I refused to think about what would happen if we couldn’t find Hawk. My brain wouldn’t even go there. Maybe it was self-preservation.

  I turned back towards the direction of the house, hating that I had to sleep in a big empty bed and that I had no idea where my son rested his head this night.

  Hands skate down my body, eliciting chills of desire.

  “Keep your eyes closed,” a gritty voice whispers.

  I’d do anything to keep feeling the pleasure shooting through me, so I keep my eyes firmly shut.

  Warm lips brush against my mouth before moving downward. Strong arms hold me in place, rendering me helpless, making me a slave to my own desire. My lover licks and laves, teases and coerces, begging me to beg him.

  His hands grip my hips as he slides into me. “Open your eyes,” he commands.

  I stare into the face of my husband. He moves over me, his face taut, our mutual pleasure binding us.

  “I love you. You’re mine,” he states.

  As soon as he says the words, Flynn’s face changes, and it’s Dolinsky moving inside of me. He reaches underneath my body and pulls me closer. My head snaps back in excitement, in shame.

  “You’re mine,” Dolinsky states. “You’ll never be free of me.”

  “No,” I plead, wanting him to release me, wanting him to pull me closer.

  “I’m so deep inside you, I’m in your skin, I’m in your heart. I’m exactly where you don’t want me.” His lips capture mine and suddenly I’m tearing at his back, drawing blood.

  The face above me changes again. Vlad’s glittering dark eyes are as vast as the open universe. Hatred and lust war on his face; he wraps his hand around my throat.

  “I have a part of you that no one else does,” he grits, his deep voice thick with his Russian accent. “I took everything good from you and I’ll keep on taking it.”

  He pounds into me harder, faster. My brain is terrified at the loss of air, yet my body craves it. It knows what’s happening. My psyche wants to shrivel up and die, my soul wants to fly from my body.

  Vlad lets go of my throat and I come hard, clamping around him, wanting to bruise, wanting to break him, like he broke a part of me.

  Suddenly the heat of him is gone and it’s just me, desire slick on my skin. I hear a baby cry.

  Hawk.

  I search for him, but I don’t find him.

  I woke up, the echo of a baby’s cry in my ears. I got out of bed, only to remember that Hawk wasn’t down the hall from me, and he hadn’t cried out for me. I shivered. I’d lit a fire before I went to bed, so I wasn’t shivering because of the cold.

  Without hesitation, I slid my hand down the front of my pajama bottoms. I was wet. And still ridiculously aroused.

  Climbing back into bed, I settled the covers on top of me. I glanced at the clock. It was a little past five in the morning; I knew I wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep. If I were in New York, I would lace up my running shoes and hit the pavement of Central Park. Running always helped me clear my head.

  “Fuck a duck,” I said to myself. I threw off the blankets again. I couldn’t go running yet—the doctor hadn’t cleared me for it—but I could do some light exercise. I got dressed and looked out the window; it was snowing—light and dry, and hardly sticking, but I didn’t want to be out in it.

  I wished I still had a job, something to throw myself into. I’d loved my history research job at Columbia. But then Flynn had come into my life, and there simply hadn’t been room for anything else. That sounded terrible, like I’d given up vital pieces of myself to be with him. Things were allowed to change because people did. I changed; I hadn’t wanted children. Hawk had been an accident—a happy one in the end.

  I crept downstairs, quiet, despite the fact that it was near impossible to disturb anyone since we were in a castle. I threw on my coat and boots, grabbed my keys and phone, and headed outside for the garage. There was always a driver on duty and so I didn’t worry about the early hour. We left Duncan’s estate and headed in the direction of town. Nothing was open, not even the coffee shop, but I wasn’t going into town. I had Callum take me to my home. If he was surprised by my request, he didn’t show it.

  When he parked outside the castle that I shared with Flynn, I sat for a moment and stared at it. It had been the perfect place. I remembered the day Flynn had shown it to me nearly six months ago. I hadn’t even made it across the threshold before knowing it was our home. We’d made love on the sitting room carpet in front of the fireplace, fallen asleep in each other’s arms, and when dawn had come, we’d made love again.

  Now it was just the place where my son had been taken from me. But I had plans to reclaim it, exorcise the ghosts that had taken up residence, both in my home and in my soul.

  “Ma’am?” Callum asked, looking at me in the rearview mirror.

  He was solid and sturdy, a bear of a man. A true Scotsman.

  “I need your help, Callum.”

  Chapter 24

  “Where have you been all day?” Ash asked when I came into the sitting room. She was alone, except for the hounds and Betty.

  I collapsed into exhaustion onto the couch, envy pouring through me when I saw Ash with a glass of wine. True, I could drink. But I was trying to stay in routine of pumping breast milk in anticipation for when Hawk came home.

  “Out,” I said evasively, not wanting to share what I was doing at the house.

  Ash accepted my answer as she continued to flip through the design catalog on her lap. She leisurely took a sip of her glass of red wine.

  I closed my eyes for a moment. “Where’s Duncan?” I asked.

  “Resting.”

  “Oh?”

  “He didn’t get much sleep last night,” she said.

  I opened my eyes to look at her. She smirked with feminine power and then reined it in, not wanting to rub it in my face, which I appreciated.

  “We got some snow,” I said, striving to change the conversation.

  “Hmmm.”

  “Think they got snow in London?”

  She set the magazine aside and shrugged. “Not sure. Haven’t heard from him?”

  “Not since yesterday morning.”

  “You’re worried.”

  “Yes.”

  “You shouldn’t be. They’re just gathering information.”

  “You really don’t get it, do you?” I asked.

  She frowned. “I get it.”

  “No. You don’t. After all this time, how can you say something like that? It doesn�
�t make me feel better.”

  Her eyes widened in surprise. “Barrett—”

  “You’ve got your head up your own ass,” I said angrily, rising from the couch.

  “Wait just a God damn minute,” Ash seethed, also standing. “You think because you’ve been in this world, what, a year, you know what the hell you’re talking about?”

  I laughed, but it was bitter and maniacal. I was exhausted, spent. “Should I remind you what’s happened to me in the last year?”

  My statement had Ash pausing. Her eyes dropped from mine and her apology was quick. “I’m sorry.”

  Just like that, my anger drained from me. “Me too. I was picking a fight.”

  “I wish I knew what to say to you.”

  I thought for a moment. “Placating me doesn’t help. Not right now. I’m also wicked tired. I was up early today.”

  “Yeah,” she said. “I thought so. You weren’t at breakfast. Go take a nap.”

  I shook my head. “If I sleep now, I won’t sleep through the night. I had an idea I wanted to run by you.”

  “Me?” she asked in confusion.

  “Yeah,” I said. “Well, you and Lacey. I have to see if she’d even want to do it. But I wanted to pick your brain first.”

  We retook our seats and I stretched out on the couch, letting the ache in my back have a chance to ease. A bath in the large tub in the guest bathroom was sounding like a good idea.

  “Lacey wants to leave her job as club manager,” I said.

  “Get out.”

  “It’s true.”

  “But she’s so good.”

  “Yeah, she is, but she’s ready for something new. I was thinking… You know she takes amazing photographs.”

  Ash fanned herself. “Uh, yeah. I’ve seen the one of you hanging in your bedroom.”

  I refused to be embarrassed. It was a photo of me on stage when I’d performed burlesque and I looked like I was in the middle of an orgasm. It wasn’t so surprising that Flynn wanted it framed and mounted on our wall.

  “I think it’s time she had an art show,” I said.

  “Ah, and you want me to call my contacts.”

  “I do.”