by Teagan Kade
“You taste so fucking good.” I give her a wicked smile. I can tell from the expression on her face she wants it, even if she doesn’t realize it.
“I…” she starts and gasps as I dip my fingers back into her pussy. Rubbing my thumb over her swollen clit, I stroke two fingers in and out of her silky passage. Her voice hitches, breaks, and cracks as she gasps and throws her head back as her hips tilt towards me, riding my hand.
I pull back when I feel her body tighten. Her head snaps forward at the loss of it and she looks at me with a flash of anger.
“Greedy little girl, aren’t you?” I smile.
“I’m not a little girl.” She rankles at the term, her fingers biting harder into my biceps. There will be bruises there tomorrow, I’m sure of it.
Good, I want her to mark me too. I want her so out of her mind with needing me she can’t control herself, can’t wall herself off behind that stubborn, independent attitude.
“Here. Taste,” I say, ignoring her retort and bringing my fingers in front of her. She’s startled, I can tell, unsure, curious, and somewhere in all of that, she’s enticed. “You don’t have to be afraid or water yourself down with me, Edie. I want to know every dark, dirty thought you have,” I murmur against her throat. “And I want to show you mine. Now, I told you to taste.” I say the last with more command than I would normally. It’s a risk I know, showing this side of me, but one I need to take. I need to know how deep down the rabbit hole we’re about to fall.
I drag my fingers over my lips, smearing my mouth with her essence. Then, drawing her face to mine, I kiss her softly so she can taste the sweet, tangy flavor. I smile when I feel her tongue drag along my lips, tentative and then with more eagerness.
Something in her seems to click and, before I know it, she’s drawing my hand up to her, licking and sucking at my fingers. My smile fades and my cock throbs. I know she’s wet and ready for me and I can’t wait much longer to thrust into her.
I stand up and she moves to get up with me. “No. You stay on your knees.”
She looks at me suspiciously and asks, her voice sultry, “What if I don’t want to?”
I study her, gathering her hair in my hand again. The ponytail she’d pulled it into has long since fallen apart and her hair is a light mass of wavy silk. She rolls her head into the movement as I give a little tug, testing how much she’s giving herself over to me.
“Oh, I know you do.” Her mouth opens and she bites down on her lower lip, but I can see the curve of a smile still. One hand wound in her hair, I unzip my pants so my erection springs free at her eye level.
Her eyelids flutter open and droop as she reaches out.
“Ah, ah, ahh,” I correct her. “Sorry, sweetheart, you can only use your mouth.”
I bring myself to her mouth and she keeps her eyes on my face as she slips her tongue out and makes brief, flicking contact. I suck in my breath as I guide her head further towards me and she parts her lips, taking me into the scorching heat of her mouth.
She hasn’t blinked, just continued watching me with those big, dark eyes. My gaze locked on hers, I lead her movement, gently at first then with rising speed as the sensation builds. The sight of her on her knees with her mouth full of me, her hair bouncing with each pump—fuck, it’s so hot. My hand drops from her hair and still she keeps up with the motion, her hands reaching behind and clawing into my thighs, bringing me towards her.
It doesn’t last long. It’s not my first rodeo, not by a long shot, but with her there’s a heightened thrill because I know I’m going to take my time exploring her, taking her in every way I can.
I pull back on a groan before it goes too far and I come earlier than I want to. Her look is feral when I pull her to her feet and neither of us says a word as I strip her down. Pulling each piece of clothing off her slowly, languidly. It’s cold out, but I don’t feel it. Aside from her tightly peaked nipples, it doesn’t seem to bother her either.
I reach my hand back between her thighs and nudge her open, pushing her pants down as I do it until I’m kneeling before her.
“Grab something behind you.” I order her. Dutifully, she obeys, grabbing at the rock behind her and bracing her forearms. “Good girl.”
Hooking my hands around her thighs, I lift her towards me, balancing her weight on my forearms and lowering my head to taste her center more fully. But I don’t just taste, I feast. I’m patient with her but not gentle, parting the soft, swollen flesh with my tongue and exploring her like a conqueror in a new land. When she comes for me, her thighs grip either side of my head and her muscles contract, taking everything they can from me until I taste that melted honey on my tongue.
She’s breathing hard, still reeling from her orgasm when I stand up, “Turn around and brace yourself again.”
She doesn’t move right away, so I steady her and guide her through the movement. As soon as her hands are up against the rock wall, I thrust into her.
Goddamn this feels so right. She’s so tight and slick and I don’t ever want this feeling of her body pulling mine, needing mine, to end. I’m so hard, so eager for her, and I drive into her with all the force of the pent up stress and emotion of tonight. Soon, but not so soon I’d be embarrassed by it, I’m right there, ready to let go. But I don’t want to do it alone.
Reaching forward until my hand is in the small, neat patch of curls between her thighs, I find her clit and rub, tight spirals pressing into her until she’s panting, struggling for breath.
With one long, forceful stroke, I give us both release. The sound of our groans and gasps sound like animals and that’s fine with me because, with her, I feel raw.
With her, I am an animal.
*
“Wake up, sweetheart.” I whisper to Edie. She’s got her head on my shoulder and we’re both laying as close as we can to the wall of the recessed ledge we made it to last night. I’ve been watching her for a few minutes with an unsettling fascination. I’ve never met someone with whom I had the kind of sexual chemistry that we do. More than that, I’ve never met someone I didn’t want to let go.
She doesn’t stir and I feel a little pang of guilt at shaking her shoulder gently. I don’t blame her for being worn out. I’d be totally happy if we just stayed like this, tangled together all day. It’s a new and strange feeling to want more of someone than just one night. I have a suspicion if I let my mind go there, I wouldn’t ever get tired of her.
We’re both fully dressed again. When her eyes finally flutter open I can tell it takes her a minute to recall where we’re at and what we’re doing. The fact she’s a heavy sleeper and the fact I know that now makes me smile.
She sits up with a start when the reality hits her.
“We need to get moving,” she says, her voice is groggy but determined.
“Whoever that was after us will probably have given up by now, I’d think.” I nod, stretching and shaking my limbs awake.
Edie’s silent for a minute, chewing on her lip and looking off at something I can’t see.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
She glances back at me nervously and my stomach sinks. All I can think is that she’s about to pull back, that in the harsh light of day, she’s going to turn away from whatever the hell this is happening between us.
“I’m just thinking about how they snuck up on us last night. They weren’t on ATVs—anything motorized we would have heard coming. They were on foot which makes me think their camp can’t be too far.” She’s looking away again, thinking out loud.
“What makes you think they’re even camped… they might have driven in. There are a lot of possibilities here, and this isn’t the best time to be going through them all. We need to focus on getting out,” I demand, not liking where I sense she’s headed.
She goes on to explain, but even as she’s talking, I’m not really hearing. With every word, I hear the growing decisiveness in her voice.
Finally, while she’s talking about wolverines and tracking, I
cut in, “No.”
She looks at me confused. “No what?”
“Absolutely no. We are not going to search for them. They almost killed us yesterday. Trying to go after them again without backup, without proper protection is insanity. No, and that’s final.”
Her back straightens. I can see the lines of frustration setting into her expression.
Damn it, why does she have to be so difficult?
“I don’t think I asked your permission,” she answers, turning away from me, but I stop her, grabbing her arm and turning her around to face me again.
“Edie. No,” I insist, terrified and angry she’d even think about going up against them again after the way she froze up. The fact I got us out of there was nothing but total dumb luck. The idea that I might not be able to do the same a second time around is impossible to swallow.
“This isn’t your call.” She glares at me, anger flashing. “You’re not my keeper and you have no right…”
“No right to what?” I feel myself exploding with frustration. Fuck! She drives me crazy. “No right to care whether you get yourself killed? Jesus, no wonder your family worries about you. You get a whiff of something and you just go head first after it, hunting for danger like a drunk looking for the first bar that will serve them. I said no, you’re not going after them. The conversation is over.”
“Don’t you dare take that tone with me,” she warns, fury simmering behind her words.
“Yeah, well, you didn’t seem to mind it when I was fucking you,” I snap back and instantly regret it.
She slaps me, but the look on her face makes her look like the one who’s been struck.
Fine, if I have to hurt her to keep her safe, that’s what I’ll do.
“Try and stop me,” she says, and before I can grab at her she’s scrambling over the ledge and climbing down with none of the hesitation she showed yesterday. Her footing and hand holds are perfect. Her anger is a powerful force and it’s driving her into motion away from me.
“Goddamned crazy woman,” I mumble, following her down.
In the back of my mind, there’s more than just fear for today. Say we get out of this, say she somehow doesn’t get us both killed and thrown in a ditch. How am I supposed to handle being in a relationship in general, let alone with a woman who can’t seem to spend a full twenty-four hours without walking blindly towards certain death?
Between the fear, the uncertainty, and the anger roiling in my stomach, it’s a bitch of a climb. I can’t shake the feeling I’m not getting out of this forest in one piece. Whether it’s the poachers or Edie, my chances for escape are slim.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
EDIE
In the light of day I can’t believe I climbed up this rock wall with Deric in the middle of the night with bullets flying. Right now I’m too pissed off at him to think about it, but later I’ll be sure to freak out.
Maybe it was the most incredible sex of my life, so what? I’m mature enough to admit that even with a vibrator I’ve never had an orgasm like that where I was literally seeing stars. It doesn’t matter, though. It doesn’t matter if it feels like a hidden part of me was awakened when we touched, like I was discovering a different part of myself that had been locked away.
What matters is that he thinks that what we did gives him some kind of authority over me. I’m not some Fleshlight he can fuck and put back for safe keeping. He could have been reasonable, and we could have discussed it. I started to do just that, to explain this is too big to leave alone, but he just snapped and decided to give me orders like he’s in charge.
I don’t need one more person bossing me around. Maybe he’s right. Maybe I put myself in danger, but I’d rather take the risk and live my life than let someone else sideline me. Besides, these aren’t some backwoods hillbillies poaching a deer now and then. This is obviously a significant operation and these guys have made it clear they’re willing to go as far as they need to protect it. I can’t walk away now, not when I know they could hurt someone else. Hell, that they might have already hurt someone else.
I drop to the packed earth at the base of the route on the cliff we followed last night. I glance over my shoulder to see he’s trailing me, making his way with double the speed I covered the same path. He throws me a look of warning that tells me I probably shouldn’t be standing here when he gets down.
Pfft! He’s the one who should be avoiding me!
I can’t exactly shout in case someone is nearby, so instead I simply watch him with the anger seething off of me. But damn him! In the morning light, moving like this, with all his strength on display, it’s a thing of beauty to watch him climb. I should start hiking, put some distance between us so he can’t stop me, but for a minute my breath just catches and I watch him.
It’s not that warm, but he’s taken his shirt off and stuffed it in his pack. The light bounces off the sheen of sweat that coats his muscles. His movements are so confident, so graceful and smooth, like all he’s climbing is a set of monkey bars and not a massive cliff where one misstep would lead to certain death.
I press my thighs together, warding off the sensitive ache. Angry as I am at him, my body still craves his. The men I’ve dated have been so intimidated by my career, my family… None of them have taken charge like that. I might hate it in any other setting, but it was pretty damn sexy to have my body man-handled like that, to give myself over to him. It didn’t hurt the man was hung like a freaking beast or that he knew how to coax my body into a state of unearthly arousal.
No! Stop being a horny bimbo.
No wonder he has women falling all over him. Here I am, drooling when I have a case to bust. He’s only got about ten more feet to cross when I turn around and start walking into the woods. I can hear him calling quietly behind me, but I ignore him.
“Wait for me, damn it!” he huffs in a yell-whisper.
I don’t turn around. Instead, I start looking for tracks, trying to determine the direction the poachers came from.
“You’re a real pain in the ass, you know that?” he growls, as he finally catches up to me.
I turn to smirk and say something smart back, but he’s inches from me. The impressive expanse of his rock-hard chest is front and center, a faint dusting of blonde hair leading in a delicious vee below his waistband to a place I’ve already tasted and am hungry for again.
“You’re not stopping me.” I manage to maintain some level of cool defiance.
“No?” He pushes forward, backing me against a tree.
“No,” I say firmly, even as he’s tipping my chin up to him. “You can’t.”
“It’s a mistake to underestimate me, you know that? I’m not going to let you go off and get yourself killed.” His hand slides between my legs, roughly pushing past my waistband, creeping beneath my panties. I should push it away, I definitely shouldn’t let him touch me right now, but cripes, it feels so good. “I don’t play fair. When it comes to getting what I want, I’ll play as dirty as I need to.”
My breath quickens and I squeeze my lips together, trying not to give in to the moan that wants to escape.
His mouth is sucking at the skin just below my ear, the flash of his golden hair at the edge of my vision. It doesn’t take long — with him stroking my throbbing, wet flesh — before I’m panting, sobbing and clinging to his bare chest.
With a growl he rips my pants down and I feel the thick, demanding head of his cock nudging into me. His hands lift beneath my thighs and my feet leave the ground, which is good because the incredible fullness of his invasion saps all the strength from me.
He drives into me, my back scraping against the tree through my shirt—the faint abrasion adding to the pleasure. With each thrust, bark gets knocked into my hair and I feel sap sticking to my clothes and bare skin. I’m going to look like a mess after this, but I don’t care.
I tighten around him, edging closer to one of those miraculous, vision-blurring orgasms when he suddenly slows down.
Deric lifts his head and looks at me, stroking slowly into me still in some kind of hypnotic, erotic dance that’s just shy of orgasm. “You want to come, don’t you sweetheart?”
I nod my head, too far gone to feel offended by the way he’s talking to me. If I’m being honest, I like it. I hate it when that ego, that assured sexuality is directed towards other women, but… when it’s directed at me? I freaking love it.
He smiles, rhythmically thrusting with all the speed of a slow heartbeat. “Good. Then promise you’ll listen and come back to town with me.”
Anger rises up in me, even as he’s building the need. “No!” I snap.
“You want me to fuck you, you want me to let you come, then you have to listen to me,” he insists.
“Screw you.” I slap at him but only half-heartedly because he’s still driving in and out and, as angry as I am, I’m not ready to stop.
He smiles faintly, his own lust evident in his tight expression. “You know the condition for that…”
“Fine, then you can stop, because you know where I stand,” I counter, even as my breath starts to come in shallow pants.
He doesn’t stop. His expression is dark and hard to read, but he doesn’t stop. Maybe he can’t?
My fingers wind into his hair, fisting tight the way he did to me the night before. I lean forward so my mouth is beside his ear.
“Stop whenever you want, Deric. I don’t care. I don’t need this...” I lie as I put my lips to his neck, nibbling and sucking, letting my teeth graze the cut lines of his shoulders.
“Damn you!” He groans and drives deeper and faster again. It’s angry, it’s hot, it’s desperate and I want it so badly it scares me.
I smile even as I feel the orgasm gripping me, loving that he couldn’t stop.