“Thank you, kind sir,” she murmured in her best Southern accent.
Pulling her upright he laughed down into her eyes.
“That’s terrible. You sounded more like a Liverpool docker rather than a prim Southern miss.”
“Oh shucks and here I was thinking I was turning you on.”
“Oh really? Well, let me tell you, my dear wife, that you don’t need any soft, sexy accents to turn me on. You just need to be you.” And with that he bent his head and kissed her most thoroughly.
Moments later, coming up for air, she squealed in protest as he threw her over his shoulder and marched to the door.
“Where are we going?”
“Silly question, my love. We’re going to bed, where I can ravish you most thoroughly.”
“But what about the tree?”
“No, I’m not going to ravish the tree, my love, just you—my wife.”
“Oh well, in that case.” She giggled as he threw her onto the bed. “Ravish away, good sir.”
What followed was most satisfactory. Mason’s hands and mouth worked their usual magic and consumed with passion she was helpless in his arms. His caresses turned her limbs fluid and her bones to jelly. And when he penetrated her core with his massive cock she could do nothing but helplessly lie spread-eagled underneath him as he brought her time and time again to the brink of an orgasm, before slowing things right down, leaving her enervated and hot like a simmering kettle. Barely able to speak she begged him with her eyes to turn up the heat and take her to heaven. Moments later as Mason’s hips worked like pistons and his rampant manhood caressed her G-spot she exploded on an orgasm that felt as if she were splintering into a million tiny pieces. Later as she lay warm and satisfied in his arms the words that kept repeating in her head were—my love. Mason had called her “my love,” not once but twice. Surely that had to mean something!
* * * *
The next few days passed relatively slowly. The buildings were going up at a rate of knots and the clinic was now finished and the vet, Simon French, was already in situ, checking supplies and equipment. Already a resident had taken up home in one of the outbuildings, an orphaned fawn. The mother had sadly been killed on the road, leaving the young one to fend alone. Simon had examined him and declared him fit and well but far too young to survive alone. Therefore he was now their first guest and Holly was ecstatic, spending much time bottle feeding him and gently murmuring sweet nothings in his tiny ear. Mason, passing on one of these occasions, smiled indulgently but warned her not to get too attached. He was after all a wild animal and this was not a zoo.
Pooh-poohing his cynicism, Holly nonetheless restricted her visits to three a day, but leaving him after each visit got harder and harder.
It was on one of those visits that she suddenly felt spooked. Looking up from feeding the fawn, she glanced around. It was growing dark but the electric lamps gave off a soft yellow glow and nothing appeared out of place. Outside the snow was still steadily falling, creating a kind of soft silence. Mason was in town at an urgent meeting with the council, but there were still a lot of men working outside. Mrs. Henry was in the house getting supper and the vet was still in the clinic. Reassured, she checked the amount of fluid in the baby’s bottle and offered the teat to the fawn who suckled eagerly and strongly, jerking her arm in his efforts to quickly get the milk.
The milk finished, Holly bedded down the fawn, stroking his satiny coat and twirling his silky ears. The fawn’s eyes, big and brown, gazed adoringly back at her as she lightly tickled him under his chin and planted a soppy kiss on his tiny nose.
“Night, night, sweetheart,” she whispered from the door, turning to blow him a kiss. Smiling at her idiosyncrasies she pulled up the hood of her coat and hurried out in to the now fast-falling snow back to the house.
The moon was out, shining weakly through the thickly falling flakes, and as she exhaled a small puff of frosty air shimmered in the darkness. Her feet in their outsize Wellingtons slipped haphazardly as she walked, ploughing through the deep banks of snow. The house with its brightly lighted windows looked warm and welcoming and she hurried along as fast as she could. She had that feeling again, the one of being watched and was frightened by it. Taking a minute, she stopped and looked quickly around. The builders had gone, the snow finally sending them home to their families and where once had been a bank of parked trucks was now just an open snow-covered field. Whether Mason had returned home she did not know, but Sumo and Mrs. Henry were inside along with hot soup and homemade bread and this thought alone sent her scurrying toward the house. However, in doing so she failed to see the sinister figure stepping back into the shadows.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Holly shook the snow from her coat and hanging it up in the closet made her way to the kitchen.
“Ahh, there you are, Miss Holly. Mr. Black rang a while back and said he’s a bit delayed. Got car trouble so he has. So as you’ll now be cold how about some of my chunky vegetable soup to warm you up? It’ll keep you going until suppertime.”
“Lovely, Mrs. Henry, and then I’ll go and have a shower.” She glanced through the window. “I just hope this snow doesn’t delay Mason any longer.”
“Don’t you worry, Miss Holly. Mr. Black’s a big strong soldier and has been in worse weather than this, I’ll be bound. Now you just sit yourself down to my lovely soup.”
Doing as suggested, Holly blew on a spoonful of the rich broth before taking a tentative sip. “Mmm, Mrs. Henry, this is gorgeous.”
Mrs. Henry nodded. “Just so, Miss Holly.”
An hour later, fresh and warm from the shower, Holly wandered back toward the window. If anything the snow was falling harder. Everywhere was covered in a blanket of white. Ringing Mason on his mobile was met with no luck. Probably there wasn’t a signal due to the worsening weather conditions. Staring out into the night, she willed Mason’s Jeep to come up the drive, but with each passing second she realised that willing something to happen wouldn’t necessarily mean it would. Trailing back to sit in front of the fire, she curled up in his massive fireside chair and stared into the flames. The warmth of the room and the mesmerising leaping of flames comforted and relaxed her. Her eyelids grew heavy and the ticking of the clock and the gentle snoring of Sumo lulled her into a deep sleep and not even the almost silent opening of the front door followed by the living room door awakened her. Sumo lifted his head and growled, just a slight rumbling in his chest. Then rising laboriously to his feet he ambled to the door where his grumble turned to a deep growl. A small yelp and all became silent. Holly shifted restlessly in her seat, vaguely aware of something, but too tired to open her eyes she slipped back into a deep slumber.
* * * *
Mason, sitting beside the mechanic on the drive home through the swirling snow, cursed everything around him, from the broken alternator, to the inept mechanic and the bad weather. Holly was probably sick with worry wondering where he had got to, but not as worried as he was about her. He’d hated to leave her, but his meeting with council had been urgent, a last chance to get their signature on important documents before they broke up for Christmas. He’d felt okay about leaving Holly at the time. The men were there, so she was surrounded by protection of one form or another. He gave a fleeting thought to Sumo. Glancing impatiently at his watch, his gaze returned to staring out of a snow-flecked windshield. It was late and dark and with the weather worsening the men were sure to have gone home. He took heart from this thought. With the bad weather the house would be difficult to reach and only the most foolish would venture out. His jaw hardened and he ground his teeth.
His face hardened as he thought of Alex. “The most foolish or the most determined.”
“Eh?” The mechanic stared at him.
“It’s nothing. Do you think you can make this thing go any faster?”
“Nah, don’t want to get stuck in a drift do we?”
Refusing to acknowledge the mechanic, Mason contained his impatience and s
tared back out of the window.
* * * *
Holly frowned in her sleep. Wakefulness gradually coming to the surface, she blinked slowly, attempting to get her bearings. From being unfocused her gaze abruptly became focused and she started in alarm. Standing beside the chair, looking down at her was—Alex!
Pushing deeper into the chair as if she could escape through its back, she stared fearfully at the man that had hunted her in the woods and haunted her dreams ever since.
“Alex, w-what are you doing here?” she whispered, terror drying her mouth.
“Woman, did you really think you could escape me? You are a disobedient bitch and now you need to pay.”
Holly wanted to plead with him, beg him to spare her life, but she just couldn’t. Secure in her relationship with Mason she had grown stronger over the last few weeks, and to plead for her life to this barbarian was now an anathema to her. She lifted her chin and, willing her voice not to tremble, she stared him straight in the face.
“I have paid. I’ve paid you fifteen thousand pounds, money I didn’t have, money I willingly gave to save you, but from what? From nothing, that’s what. You are the deceiver. You lied, you took me for a fool, and I, stupid that I am, willingly went where you led, believing that you loved me. Believing that we had a future together, but it was all lies. Deceit to get money from me.” She drew a trembling breath. “Do you know what you did to me? How worried I was about you and how scared I was for your safety?”
Alex bent down and grabbed her arm, his long nails biting cruelly into her flesh.
“You stupid woman, I worked for that measly fifteen thousand pounds. Do you know how nauseating it was to listen whilst you poured out your grief for your dead husband? How sick you made me, wanting so very badly to be loved, and protected? You needed me to tell you what to do, how to do it, and what your future should be, so believe me, woman, I earned that money, every nauseating penny of it. Don’t you realise just how difficult it was to send you love poems in order to convince you that I cared and then listen to your constant whining about how so very lonely you were? I deserved more than you paid, having to be supportive and pretend I care, when you bleated out your hard-luck story. And yet still you denied me what was mine by right. I needed that extra money.” He stared hard into her distressed face and a flicker of cruelty entered his eyes, widening her own in response. “You know I have a wife, a loving woman and a child at home, a woman who is bright, beautiful, and completely obedient. A woman so different to you it’s almost laughable that you could ever imagine I would really be interested in you. And then there is this…”
He touched the lump on the back of his head. “You injured me, nearly killed me. So you really think I can forgive that betrayal of our friendship?”
“You were trying to kill me. You shot an arrow at me and I was just defending myself.”
“Silent!” he shouted, sending saliva spraying in all directions.
Grimacing in disgust she took a tissue from her pocket and wiped her face. This action incensed him more and he took hold of her arm and pulled her viciously from the chair.
“No more talk, now you pay.”
Twisting and pulling in an attempt to get away from him, Holly kicked out, catching Alex in the shins. He howled in pain and shook her hard, making her teeth rattle and her head flop backward and forward. Finally he hit her viciously around the face, making her bite down on her lip, drawing blood. Dragging her to the door and out of the room, he showed her no mercy as she slipped and fell only to have him ruthlessly drag her back to her feet.
Calling for Mrs. Henry and then for Sumo, Holly almost cried in despair when no help was forthcoming. Alex laughed manically. “Stupid, stupid woman, did you think I wouldn’t have dispensed with them before I came to get you?”
Holly’s breath caught in horror and tears filled her eyes. “Oh God, no!” This was all her fault. Mrs. Henry and Sumo were innocents who had suffered for her foolishness, her desperate need to find someone to love. Alex was right. She was a foolish woman.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked in a tremulous voice.
“Somewhere where I can be sure we won’t be interrupted.”
“Why not here? We won’t be interrupted here.” God what was she saying. She had just given Alex carte blanche to kill her on the spot.
“Err, what I mean is, err, we need to perhaps go to the barn.” The barn was dim and she knew all the nooks and crannies like the back of her hand, and maybe if she could get him to lower his guard she could slip away from his hold and hide until Mason got home.
Alex narrowed his eyes and he stared at her suspiciously. “Why so eager to go to the barn? Could it be you are hoping to escape?”
“No, no, why should you think that? I mean you are bigger and stronger than me, and so there’s no way I, a woman, could get away from you. Is there?”
Scrutinising her face for a moment, Alex then continued to drag her to the front door.
“Wait, wait.” Holly caught hold of the doorframe with desperate fingers preventing him from pulling her outside.
He jerked her arm harder. “You come with me now.”
“I will, I will, it’s just, it’s cold out there. I need my coat and boots.” She looked down at her fluffy slippers. “I can’t walk in these. They’ll stick to the snow.”
Releasing her abruptly he gave her a little shove. “Get ready and don’t take all day about it.”
Holly slipped off her slippers and moving as slowly as she could without letting Alex realise that she was playing for time, time for Mason to come back, she made much of rummaging in the cupboard for her boots.
A yank on her hair had her screaming in pain and grabbing at Alex’s tightening hand.
“Stop it, that hurts, please stop.”
Pushing his face close to hers, he whispered in her ear, his voice almost a hiss. “Then stop taking me for a fool and get your boots on, or I’ll drag you out barefooted.” He gave her hair another hard tug.
Tears filling her eyes at the pain in her head, Holly quickly pulled on the boots and stood up. “My coat,” she said as Alex made to take her arm. “It’s, err, it’s in my bedroom.” She crossed her fingers behind her back hoping Alex would believe her.
Alex narrowed his eyes, his jaw hard and set and his mouth twisting into a sneer. “Take this one.” He handed Holly the coat she had been wearing earlier.
“It’s too big,” she protested, attempting to delay him as long as she possibly could. God, where was Mason?
Grabbing the neck of her sweater, Alex jerked her to him and pushed his face close to hers. “It’s your coat. You were wearing it earlier. So either put it on now and stop wasting time or you go as you are. Comprende?”
Quickly pulling on her coat, Holly drew up the zip and waited for whatever was to happen next.
Yanking open the front door, Alex pulled her across the veranda and down the steps.
Chapter Twenty-Four
As the pickup truck turned into the drive of Saviour, Mason, in a no-nonsense voice, told the mechanic to cut the lights and come to a stop. The mechanic looked at him in astonishment, a look Mason patently ignored. The windscreen wipers were working efficiently, but still visibility was poor. Climbing from the vehicle, he stared at the house. His gaze then swiftly scanned the grounds. Narrowing his eyes in order to focus, he wiped the flakes from his face. Then reaching into his pack in the back of the vehicle he pulled forth a pair of binoculars and adjusted the focus. Yes, he’d thought he’d seen movement at the side of the house. It was difficult to be sure, but it appeared two figures were moving unsteadily toward the barn. Clenching his jaw, he climbed back in the truck and nodded to the mechanic.
“Take me to the house, but don’t activate your lights.”
Sending Mason a nervous glance, the mechanic complied and after a short drive drew up at the house with a spin of the tyres.
Climbing from the truck, Mason bypassed the house and began to move swiftl
y in the direction the two figures had taken, ignoring the mechanic as he turned the vehicle and raced back down the drive. The footprints in the snow confirmed Mason’s suspicions. One was small and light, the other heavier and large, a man and a woman, Alex and Holly.
Silently he cursed the weather, his decision to go to the meeting, and Alex’s arrogance.
* * * *
Holly was frightened. She had to admit it. Alex was scary. It wasn’t just his appearance, his swarthy, poxed skin, and the scar. It was his cruel eyes, the crueller twist of his lips, and his total conviction that he was in the right. She had tried reasoning with him, pleading to him to be sensible, insisting he would get caught, and even tried appealing to his better nature, presuming he had one, but all to no avail. Alex wanted revenge, wanted to make her pay and most of all wanted to see her suffer. His hold was secure and even if she somehow managed to pull free, he was bigger and stronger than her. Apparently he had been to Saviour before as he appeared to know his way around. Therefore, what chance did she have even if she were able to get free?
She had to think! Mason would be home if not soon, eventually, and he would come looking for her, so all she had to do was distract Alex long enough in order to get away. Simple! She wished.
They were nearing the barn, and Holly was cold, scared, and all out of options, but she knew she had to do something and do it fast. But what? She bit hard on her lip as he tugged open the barn door and, pushing her forward, followed her inside. Closing the door behind them, he switched on the lights. One bulb flickered and died with a bang, making Holly jump, such were her nerves. The barn was warm. The light that was left soft, and the smell was of hay and beast. She looked at the fawn lying contentedly in its nest of straw. He looked back at her, his eyes large like limpid pools and his lashes impossibly long. Holly was aware of all this within moments of entering the barn, and she was also particularly aware of the oil lantern on the workbench. Now she had an idea.
Third Time Lucky (Siren Publishing Classic) Page 13