by Molly E. Lee
Him starving, and thirsty, and most surely cold, while I was eating and drinking in the comfort of the tent, was wrong on a number of levels. And although I’d never admit to him that I watched his show, I’d always thought that he had to get help off camera. Who would put themselves through such torture for a show?
Easton would, apparently. I should’ve known better. There was something raw in his determination to survive under the extreme strains he placed upon himself. Something deeper than the desire to put on a good show, to be authentic. The way he pushed himself, tortured himself, it seemed more like an atonement than a duty. I had no idea what plagued him to the point of breaking himself on camera while conducting larger-than-life expeditions, but I was smart enough to know it wasn’t about leaving me. That pain was crystal clear, and I could see it in his eyes every time we turned the cameras off and spoke like we used to. Without walls, defenses, or acid from the hurt.
This pain, whatever pushed him to the edge of survival each show, each dig, each mission . . . it was stronger than what we had been. And knowing that terrified me. Because if it was more powerful than the intense love we’d shared, then it was something wicked, dark, and twisted, and I had no idea how to help him.
But I wanted to.
I had the profound need to soothe the pain that had become ingrained in his life, to strip him of it and leave him fresh and renewed, closer to the Easton I had loved all those years ago. It had taken me a year to break through the walls he’d created growing up on the streets of Oregon. He had been hardened to compassion and friendship, but after I’d made him realize I wasn’t going anywhere, and gained his trust, he had finally let me in. I was fully prepared to do it all over again.
The challenge of starting over, coupled with everything that had happened between us, was daunting. I wasn’t sure if he’d ever really let me back in. Not enough to help lift the burden that weighed him down so much he nearly killed himself on every single show he recorded.
My body struggled with exhaustion, and I finally allowed my eyes to close. Somewhere between remembering Easton’s soothing voice as he’d read to me on the porch swing of our home base in Oregon, and dreaming about the way he could touch me, skin to soul, barely making connection with his fingers, I woke up with a start.
Easton was moaning . . . no, wailing. I rubbed my palms into my eyes, forcing the heavy blanket of sleep to free my mind. I craned my head, making sure I hadn’t mistaken the wind for his voice.
“No, no . . .” he cried softly, his voice almost lost in the air whipping between my tent and where he rested outside.
I unzipped the tent as fast as I could, my hands fumbling with sleep and trembling with adrenaline as it coursed through my veins. Flashes of a wild animal sinking its teeth into Easton’s neck, or a poisonous snake coiling around his flesh, spurred my panic.
Fuck, please don’t be a snake.
Practically falling out of the tent and onto the hard ground, I scrambled to find my footing and stumbled the short distance to him. The fire still burned, casting a warm glow between our two shelters. A breath of air escaped from my lungs as I fell to my knees beside him.
No snakes. No wild animals. Just Easton, dreaming.
He lay huddled on his side, his arms and knees drawn in to protect his body from the cold. His eyes were clenched shut, an expression of agony contorting the beautiful lines of his face. He was clearly in the throes of a vivid nightmare.
“No! Please, God!” His body jerked slightly, his hands remaining locked underneath his armpits, making him look like a person trapped in a straitjacket.
I reached out to him, my hand hovering over his face, debating if I should wake him or not. Hadn’t I read something where it was worse to wake someone in the middle of a nightmare?
“Harrison!” The plea on his lips rang clear. My father’s name. What the hell was going on inside his head?
Finally deciding whatever he saw wasn’t worth working through in his sleep, I gripped his shoulder, the angle and reach I had to do in order to not knock over his stick wall completely awkward. “Easton,” I said gently, hoping to calm him without fully waking him.
He shook back and forth, the strain in the lines of his forehead severe. “I can’t! I won’t!”
“Easton!” I shouted, unable to take the desperation in his voice, the terrible tang of fear coating his words. I’d slept with him too many times to count—before and after we’d become an item—and he’d never once had this kind of nightmare. The adrenaline hit an all-time high when I couldn’t wake him, and the more he thrashed, the more a warning bell rang in my head. A vicious alarm that made me feel useless to help whatever demon held him hostage in his mind.
Angling myself farther inside his too-tiny shelter, I hovered above him, supporting myself with one hand near his back, pressing against the rocky ground, and the other grabbing his cheek. “Easton,” I said, only an inch or so from his ear.
He jerked underneath me, his eyes popping open. He snapped his head to the side, finally locking onto my face, and he flipped to his back, causing my supporting arm to drop me fully on top of him. The breath whooshed out of my lungs as I crashed onto his hard chest, and he instantly encased me in his strong arms, squeezing me so hard I struggled to get the lost breath back.
I could feel his racing heart pounding against his chest, and he trembled beneath me, his entire body shaking. He buried his face in my shoulder, inhaling deeply, like he could drink my scent.
“Easton,” I whispered, frozen in his embrace and too terrified to move.
“I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry.” His tone still held the desperate edge it had moments ago, and I questioned if he was fully awake or not.
“It’s all right, Compass. I’m here. You’re fine. It was just a nightmare.”
He shook his head against my shoulder, his breath hitching.
“I’m sorry,” he said again, this time barely audible.
I shifted against him, wrenching a hand free and forcing him to look at me. Panic coated his beautiful brown eyes, which were only slightly illuminated from the glow of the fire slipping between the cracks of the sticks that covered the top half of our bodies. Warmth settled in my core, pulsing in the breath of space that separated our faces.
“It’s all right.” I pushed his hair off his forehead. “You’re okay.” I watched as the sharp tinge of fear transformed into something fiercer but still desperate.
He closed the tiny gap between us, bringing his lips to mine. I closed my eyes automatically, the sensation of his kiss something I’d only allowed myself to fantasize about on particularly cold nights. My heart begged me to jerk away, to run, to shield it from the weapon that had shattered it so many years ago, but my body . . . oh my body went soft and pliant against the hard planes of him.
I opened my mouth, letting him in and forgetting myself in his kiss. He cupped my face in his hands, angling me to get deeper, his tongue grazing the edges of my teeth, setting my nerves on fire. I sighed between his lips and fisted a handful of his hair, the ache in my core pulsing with a ravenous need.
He moved one hand down my back, the touch hot enough to burn through the thermal I wore, and he grabbed the back of my knee and tugged. The move shifted me until I straddled him, giving me the perfect position to feel just how hard he was. I couldn’t believe he wanted me that much, that quickly, and I shamelessly ground against him, the motion sending trembles along my skin.
Easton growled and gripped my ass, taking over and moving me up and down against him. “Rain,” he said my name against our lips and thrust against me.
The move made me gasp, the hunger for him inside me so familiar and yet completely new at the same time. I broke our kiss and arched up to catch my breath, forgetting entirely where we were. I rose too quickly, too high, and the top of my head hit the stick wall of his shelter, knocking it on its side and exposing us to the harsh, night winds of the mountains.
The cold air was enough to shock us, and
it cleared my mind of the hot, lusty haze that had fallen over it. It gave my heart enough time to scream louder, pleading its case with a heavy dose of the pain it had lived with for nearly a decade. The sharp contrast in emotions had me reeling, so I backed off, standing slowly.
Easton sighed and raked his hands through his hair as I reached for the wall. I hefted the thing up, heavier than it looked, and tried to get it at the same angle he had originally placed it. He shifted and stood, helping me re-secure the thing in silence.
A wicked awkward silence.
“Did I ruin it?” I finally asked as he repositioned the brush he’d used as insulation.
“No.” His voice was soft and ragged.
A flush raked across my skin, the heat still pulsing hot and needy in my blood.
“Did I?” He cut his eyes to me, his shoulders dropping.
I tilted my head and pressed my lips together as I reached for his hand. “What did you dream?”
He clenched his eyes shut, the strained lines reshaping his forehead just as they had during the nightmare. I waited patiently, hoping he’d let me in. After several long moments, he opened them again.
I sighed. They were cold, a wall covering the eyes that had filled with passion only seconds ago. I dropped his hand. He didn’t have to tell me, of course. Yet I wished he’d give me something . . . a piece of whatever plagued him. I turned and walked back to my tent, stopping just outside of it.
“I won’t break, Easton. Whatever it is. You can tell me.”
He hesitated, the battle clear in his eyes.
“When you’re ready,” I said. “I’m not going anywhere.” I slipped inside the tent and zipped it up.
I laid back down, trying desperately to reclaim the sleep that had held me so deeply before Easton’s nightmare. My lips were swollen from the strength of his kiss, and my skin hummed from his touch, but my heart ached with a haunting pain and the knowledge of his continued efforts to shut me out.
I grabbed my chest, as if I could hold myself together with the physical effort. I shouldn’t have kissed him. Shouldn’t have reopened the wound that still had the tendency to bleed. Maybe it would’ve been better for both of us if I’d let him remain tortured in that nightmare. Closing my eyes, I knew I could never let him stay in that much pain, not if I had the power to do anything about it.
Some things would never change.
Easton
NORMALLY A SUNRISE from the mountaintop would be something to marvel at, soak in, and savor. I could only scowl at it as the light of day fully illuminated my mistakes for the world to see.
In the darkness, fresh off the nightmare I thought I’d managed to shake years ago, I’d held Rain again and reclaimed her as mine. She’d tasted better than I remembered, and her mouth, the feel of her soft body flush with mine, was the perfect filling for the void I’d had since the day I’d left her.
I’d always suspected the hole in my heart had Rain’s name on it, but I’d deluded myself into believing it was the guilt revolving around Harrison’s death that had dug the pit. Maybe it was a combination of both. Either way, for those brief moments where she was in my arms again, my heart was full. She had the power to do that, when all these years I’d tried to fix it by pushing myself on life-and-death excavations and donating all but a small portion of the money I earned to charities Harrison would’ve loved. No amount of breaking myself for the show, or money given away, had been able to fill me like she had with her lips. Not even close.
Who knew the thing I needed most in the world was the one person I’d purposely hurt and pushed away.
You knew that, idiot.
I didn’t deserve her, or the kindness she’d shown me since she accepted the job. She genuinely wanted to help me. She should’ve slammed the door in my face and told me to go to hell for good measure. It was an asshole move, kissing her like that, but I’d been so engrossed in the nightmare, and then relieved when I’d woken with her in my arms. The glimpse of a future I’d once wanted more than anything in my entire life had shaken my resolve not to touch her.
I situated my hat and camera over my head, glaring at the damn sunrise, cursing it for making everything look different. I wanted to go back to the darkness, where I could forget my rules, my reasons for keeping Rain away from my heart, and just let her heal me.
Harrison had blamed me in the nightmare. Always had, and rightly so. The picture was so clear in my mind, reliving it over and over again until my gut twisted in my sleep. I hadn’t had a nightmare in a couple of years, though they used to wake me and send me rushing to the bathroom to empty whatever meal I’d had for dinner. Getting closer to the cave that had taken Rain’s father from her, and my mentor from me, must have forced the damned thing back into my brain, giving it free rein to fester and explode.
The exhaustion didn’t help, either. Or the fact that I hadn’t had a drink of water since we’d left the hotel in Neve Ativ.
I heard Rain breaking down the tent behind me, and I slowly turned around. She had her back to me, her long, blond hair tucked back into a tight ponytail that stuck out beneath the brim of her hat. She’d changed into a breathable cotton T-shirt and a sturdy pair of khakis with plenty of pockets, which somehow still managed to show off what an incredible ass she had. After she secured the tent to the bottom of her pack, she turned around. I locked on to those beautiful eyes that were nearly as refreshing as getting a taste of the water I so desperately craved.
“Good morning,” I said, fully aware how lame it sounded. Seriously? I’d had my tongue in her mouth not five hours ago, and my hands all over her body as she’d ground against me in the most delicious way. My dick twitched with the thought, and I mentally forced myself to lock it down. Again.
“Morning.” She flashed me a small smile, and again her kindness shook me. She didn’t glare, or accuse, or even take a drink of the water I knew she had in her pack. My crew had never hidden the luxuries afforded to them. Not that they needed to—it just put Rain on a different level. After packing up, she walked to where I stood close to the mountain’s edge and surveyed the area.
“You ready?” she asked, waiting for my cue as I stood there staring at her. I snapped out of it and nodded.
I led the way farther east and made sure to hug the path of trees that had offered us a bit of shelter from the winds last night. I stopped after a few paces, turning to face her, and looking straight at the camera on her head.
“Today’s objective is to continue to lead the opposing crew to the wrong location and pray we find a water source along the way.” I pointed to my lips and leaned closer to the lens to give the audience an up-close view. “As you can see, my body is already showing the effects of dehydration even after only a little over twenty-four hours without water. Because of the strenuous climb and hike up the mountain, much of my energy is being depleted quicker than if I stayed put. I always advise any hikers or adventurists to stock their packs with an efficient amount of water for the trip, but I want to show you what to do if you find yourself stranded without gear, or lost for days longer than what you’d initially planned for. Finding water is essential to survival, and if we don’t find a source today, I’m going to have to get creative, or risk dying in a matter of days.” I turned back around, continuing the trek along the narrow path ahead of me. My quads burned with each step, the terrain becoming steeper the farther northeast we went.
After a few miles, a sledgehammer had taken up a sick beat in my head. The pain radiated throughout my limbs, stinging with each pulse of my blood. I took a deep breath, forcing myself to focus on keeping one foot in front of the other as I pushed ahead. A slight break in the trees revealed the drop-off I’d been expecting, and I raised my hand to slow Rain behind me.
I reveled in the small victories of the mission. Looking at Rain and then the camera, I motioned her to come to me slowly, and pointed forward as she cleared the trees. She gasped, fueling the smile that cracked my dry-as-fuck lips.
“We’ve mad
e it to an incredibly high vantage point on the mountain.” I pointed toward the other mountains that bordered this one, and then to the huge drop over the ledge we stood on. “Check this out. This whole range is filled with caves, most naturally formed over time, and some dating back thousands of years. You see the gaps there?” I pointed across the wide expanse of air, trying to highlight the holes on the mountainside across from us. “Those are all caves. There are literally thousands that haven’t been explored here in Israel, some because no one can get to them safely, and others because they simply haven’t been discovered yet.” I spoke directly to the camera now, allowing the backdrop to fuel my words.
“If you believe the legends—and I’m operating under that belief—then the Babylonians, who were last rumored to hold a horde of treasure that included the infamous King Solomon’s, could have easily fled through this very mountain range after they’d looted the King’s temple. Some Babylonians were caught, but never with the treasure, and many scholars believe they were able to hide it in a naturally-formed cave as they passed through Israel in their attempts to escape.” I glanced back out toward the horizon, my heart catching at the overwhelming view and the taste of the treasure so close it made me forget how much my body hated me right now. “You can imagine the genius behind the idea, knowing it would be protected and preserved until one of their own could come back for it. Unfortunately, that never happened. Many were killed, the rest died in prisons before they could journey back.”
I craned my head to the left, my eyes sharp on the ground beneath us. Glancing behind me, and then back to the camera, I smirked. “Now this is going to be the true test of the treasure hunters who are following our tracks in the hopes to claim as their own the treasure I seek.” I gently clutched Rain’s shoulder, positioning her to get a great shot of the barely there ledge we’d have to cross in order to continue on our current track.