by Unknown
He turned and headed down the corridor with her in his arms. The sound of her weeping wrenched his heart. A nerve jerked in his cheek. He never wanted to hear her cry again.
Somehow, she’d invaded his soul.
Fury settled over him like a black cloud. By God, he owed Smitt Davis. He swallowed hard. The few hours she vanished were the worst hours of his life. He’d imagined all sorts of things happening to her. He was damned angry with her for disappearing. Furious that she’d made it impossible for him to protect her from that fucking slime ball.
And look what happened!
She’d put her life in jeopardy, not once, but twice, by being involved with that clown. Her life was still at risk, and it was something he couldn’t—wouldn’t tolerate. Allowing his gaze to dwell on her bruised face, rage simmered.
She needed a doctor.
He wanted to be the one who took care of her.
The police should be called.
Did she want the police involved?
Did he have the option of allowing her the choice?
For her safety, he didn’t think so.
Smitt was obviously unbalanced to attack her in a public facility. “Sick fuck.”
His wife stirred in his arms in response to his quietly spoken words. “Yes, he’s insane,” she whispered against his throat.
Her sooty lashes swept down and she closed her eyes. She wasn’t safe in Reno. As far as he was concerned, she wasn’t safe anywhere, except with him, and maybe not even then. Hell, he couldn’t think straight with the silken strands of her hair tangled across his throat.
She mumbled something, something so soft he had to lower his head to hear what she said. “He hurt me.”
His heart splintered and broke into a million pieces. He paused long enough to kick the door to his suite open. She flinched.
“It’s okay.” He gave her a gentle, reassuring squeeze.
She burrowed closer against his chest. Her slight body trembled in his arms.
“Easy, darlin’,” he soothed. “You’re safe now. He’ll never hurt you again.”
He marched across the wide-open space of the living room and into his bedroom.
Their bedroom, he corrected. Theirs—
No other woman had ever spent the night in this bed. No other woman ever would. The irony of the situation hit him as he lowered her to the bed. He’d wanted to find her, tuck her back in his bed, and hold her in his arms where she belonged.
Here she was, trembling like a leaf in a storm, bruised, battered, and bleeding—not the best beginning for a new marriage. He barely contained the rage that seethed through him.
Her eyelids fluttered open as he settled her on the bed and sat down beside her. His breath caught in his throat.
She was so beautiful.
Maybe she wasn’t the most beautiful woman in the traditional sense, but in his eyes, she was that and more, even if, at the moment, she looked pitiful with her eyes swollen and her nose red from crying. Her eyes were still intensely violet, fringed with wet, thick, lashes. Small-boned, delicate, she was such a little thing.
He felt his chest tighten.
She looked as fragile as a newborn foal to him. Utterly defenseless.
Why would anyone want to hurt something so small and beautiful? What kind of perverted thrill did a man like Smitt Davis get from trying to ruin something beautiful? What was it? He saw beauty, couldn’t stand it, so therefore he obliterated it?
Jace reached out and stroked a trembling fingertip down her cheek. She shied away, pulling back from his touch. “You’re gonna have one hell of a shiner and there’s a nasty cut on your cheekbone.”
She raised a shaky finger to the cut on her cheek and winced. His breath constricted painfully in his throat. “Don’t be afraid of me, darlin’. I’d never hurt you.”
“I’m not afraid of you.” She looked back at him, uncertainty in her gaze. “I’m such a mess. So…dirty. I–I don’t want you to touch what’s on me.” Tears filled her eyes. “How can you stand to even look at me?”
“You’re beautiful,” he replied simply. “What can I get for you? What do you want? Need?”
“I want a—”
She stopped mid-sentence, her slender shoulders shaking with the force of her sobs.
He flinched. Sweet Jesus, he didn’t know if he could bear this or not.
“Don’t leave me,” she cried, as he made an involuntary move to stand.
“Never.” He lifted her in his arms, carried her into the bathroom and reached past her to twist on the shower. Adjusting the water temperature to his satisfaction, he slowly, reluctantly, allowed her feet to touch the floor.
“How did you know?” she asked, shivering.
Her tear-drenched gaze searched his face for an answer.
He leveled a dark look on her. “It’s what I’d want.”
It’s what he’d wanted each time Jillian had touched him. Looking at the woman before him now, he understood her pain, anger, and the worse done to her, the shock and disbelief of the atrocities one human did to another. Understanding, he thought his heart might break. “He raped you.”
“No,” she denied vehemently.
“In your mind, he did.”
“He—”
“Listen to me, sweetheart, animals like him use fear and intimidation to break their chosen victim. It’s all about mind control, and it’s powerful. You’re stronger him. Don’t let him win.”
“He…uh…bit me. He-he…I think he drank some of my blood, like a…vampire. He bit me!” Her voice rose with disbelief and hysteria.
His body tensed. Outwardly, he was emotionless, but the dead calm settling over him was dangerously lethal. Those who knew him best knew he was most dangerous when he was at his calmest.
Inside—a seething cauldron of murderous rage boiled. When he got his hands on Smitt, the man had a date with death.
“I’ll kill that sonofabitch!”
She lowered her head. “I’m so sorry this happened.”
He gently lifted her face with a fingertip underneath her chin. “Don’t, sweetheart. You have nothing to feel guilty about. There’s no part of you I haven’t seen, touched, or tasted. You’re my wife. I plan on seeing, touching, and tasting you a lot. Where did he bite you?”
He waited patiently for her reply.
She shuddered and struggled to gather her words. “My shoulder…my…breast. He…uh…he did something to his teeth…filed them to…sharp tips…he bit…my nipple. I think he—” She shook her head and sobbed wildly. “Oh, God, I think he gets some kind of perverted thrill out of biting women’s breasts, biting off their nipples maybe. He enjoyed hurting me. I saw the desire in his eyes to bite harder. He—”
“Sssh.” He grasped the soiled camisole away from her breasts and tossed it into the trash container standing beside the vanity. Raunchy curses slipped past his lips when he spied the row of scratches across her bosom. He shifted his gaze to her breasts. “Which nipple, honey? Never mind.”
He eyed the bruised, swollen nipple, his lips tight and flat. Deep punctures and a ring of dried, crusty blood circled it. The areola looked as purple as her eyes and as mangled as a piece of raw hamburger meat. Multiple bite marks fanned across the fullness of her breast. It looked as if she’d been attacked by an angry piranha.
He glanced at her shoulder then quickly returned his gaze to it. “Jesus,” he whispered, staring in disbelief.
Deep puncture wounds lined the top of her shoulder, six on top and six more below the top bites. Blood oozed sluggishly from each site. Redness, swelling, and bruising so dark it was nearly black, surrounded the entire area. Tracks of dried blood left crusty, red ribbons trailing between her breasts.
“Fuck! I’m calling the police.” He whirled to leave the bathroom.
“No!” She latched onto his arm. “No police.”
“But—”
“Please. No cops.”
“Sweetheart, we can’t let him get by with this. He’
s a friggin’ psycho.”
“Please.” She gripped his hand and held it tightly. “He’ll do worse if I report him to the cops.”
“He’ll be in jail.”
“For how long? He’d be out in a matter of hours. The police can’t watch him constantly. He knows where I live.”
He nodded, hesitant to inform her that in a few hours, she’d be safe in Montana with him. She had enough to deal with right now. But he couldn’t help wondering why she was so adamant about not calling the cops. He wanted the bastard locked up.
What was Smitt holding over her?
How much money did she owe him?
Against his better judgment, he agreed. “All right, for now, no cops, but I don’t like it. The man’s dangerous.”
“Thank you.”
He stared angrily at her shoulder. “Don’t thank me. I want the fucker locked away.”
“I couldn’t stop him from hurting me. I tried, but he’s so strong. I couldn’t make a sound when he bit me.” She shivered. “He said he’d kill me if I made a single cry. I couldn’t stop him, Jace. I–I tried.”
She rocked back and forth, her eyes wild, tears streaming down her face. Jace clenched his teeth. He wanted to pound Smitt’s face into the dirt. He couldn’t give into the urge to punch something. Staying calm was better for her.
“Darlin,’ you’re a whole lot smaller than that muscle walking around without a brain. There’s no way you can hope to fight a man his size and come out the winner. Not without special training and skills. It was better for you to cooperate. You were less likely to be seriously injured. He’s not the kind of animal you want to piss off.”
“He…uh…he…got…and…”
Her words faded away as tears streamed down her face.
“I can figure out what happened, darlin’. I see it on your body and your clothes.”
She retched and leaned over the trashcan. Jace rubbed her back, whispered soothing words until she regained control. She drew in a shaky breath, wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.
“He…held himself between my legs…and he…uh…he…spilled on me, on my pants.” She shuddered. “He…said it was the same as him being inside me, that he pro–probably put a baby in me, even though…he…didn’t…penetrate—”
He swore softly and cradled her against his chest, gently rocking her. “Ssh. Don’t, sweetheart. Don’t think about what he did. The only baby possibly in you is mine,” he soothed.
“But what if he did?” she cried. “I can’t bear the thought of his child in me.”
“Baby, he was trying to terrorize you. He didn’t enter you, so he knows he couldn’t have possibly made you pregnant. He’s a crazy fuck. Crazy. His kind derives pleasure from planting seeds of doubt in others and tormenting them with it.”
“But—”
“No buts, sweetheart,” he said firmly, smoothing a strand of her hair behind her ear. “If you’re pregnant, it’s my baby.”
She opened her mouth to argue. He brushed a soft kiss against her lips. “Mine. I’m the only one who’s been inside you. Understand?”
She stared at him.
“Understand, sweetheart?” he repeated. “It’s all right.”
“Yes.”
But he knew in his heart it was all a lie. Nothing was all right. The seeds of doubt had been planted in her mind. In his. She wouldn’t be able to get it out of her head, no more than he could. No matter how illogical it was it lived in both their minds like some kind of evil phantom.
Smitt’s semen drenched her.
Was it possible that his sperm could live outside her body? Travel?
What if?
Mother Nature did weird things sometimes.
Yes, what if? No, he wasn’t going there. She needed him, needed his support. He wasn’t about to let his doubts drag her under.
He released his breath, eased the matching combs from her hair, and dropped them in the sink. She helped him remove her shoes, along with her socks and pants. Then he slid her panties off and arched a questioning brow.
She pointed toward the trashcan. “Everything,” she whispered. “Throw everything in the trash.”
He nodded, then lifted her in the shower. He took time to kick off his boots and socks, ripped off the belt from around his waist, dropped wallet and keys in the sink, and then stepped into the shower behind her, fully clothed.
She turned to face him, her eyes widening.
“I thought you’d feel better if I kept on my clothes.”
She didn’t say anything, just stood there trembling as steam fogged up the glass of the shower doors. She was quiet too, standing there with a bit of a glazed look to her eyes and maybe going into shock.
“You need a doctor,” he said softly.
She shook her head and for the first time he realized she was standing there crying, silent tears mingled with the spray of warm water pouring over her. His heart clenched. Damn it! He’d never felt so helpless or defeated in his life.
How could he comfort her?
What would it take to make her feel safe and secure with him?
“Baby,” he whispered tenderly, and pulled her into his arms and held her.
His breath caught in his lungs. Her breasts were pressed tightly against his chest. He clenched his teeth against the heat that shot down his spine and straight to his groin. Tapping down his need, he reached for the sponge. Squeezing vanilla scented gel onto it he gently coaxed her to lean away from him and lathered her breasts. Her belly.
He cleansed the injured nipple, taking care to be extra gentle. Still, she sucked in a sharp breath and flinched when he dabbed at the dried ring of blood on it.
“I’m sorry,” he said, searching her pale face. “I know it hurts, sweetheart, but bites like these can be dangerous. I want to make sure they’re clean.”
“I know. It’s just so tender.”
He thoroughly cleansed the bites, and then sponged off the dried blood from the deep furrows across her bosom. Lathering extra gel onto the sponge, he cleansed the bites on her shoulder, frowning as the wounds continued to ooze blood.
“I have some antiseptic ointment I’ll apply when we’re through here,” he said over the noise of the running water.
She nodded, but remained silent as he shampooed her hair, then gently pushed her to stand beneath the hot spray and rinse off. Suddenly she grabbed the sponge from his hands and sobbing wildly, scrubbed her body. She rubbed her inner thighs, her breasts, belly, her mouth, until her flesh was bright pink and glowing.
He watched helplessly. He couldn’t bear watching her anymore. He understood her need, but in his heart, she wasn’t dirty. Deliberately, he drew the sponge from her trembling fingers. “Sweetheart, stop it.”
She turned on him, a wild tigress who struck him across the face, hammered his chest with her small fists. The sound of her wailing cut him like a knife. It ripped from her soul and tore straight through his heart. His eyes burned hot and dry and he stood there and let her vent her anger, let her reign blow after blow upon him, until he was afraid she was going to injure herself.
He gathered her close against his chest and held her there, rocked her, and whispered soothing words. She struggled, attempted to strike him.
“You’ll hurt yourself, sweetheart. Please, stop this. You’re breaking my heart,” he whispered shakily.
She stilled, settling in his arms. Her head rested against his heart and she sobbed wildly. He reached behind her and turned off the shower. Then very carefully, he wrapped a warm, fluffy towel around her drenched hair and one around her body before lifting her in his arms.
His strides were long and purposeful. He marched to the bedroom and gently placed her on the bed. There, he pulled open the nightstand drawer, took out a small, first-aid kit, and flipped up the lid.
He fished out a tiny bottle of liquid antiseptic and a small bag of cotton-tipped swabs. “It’s going to hurt like hell,” he warned.
“I know.” She fixed her gaze
on the wall behind him and drew a shuddering breath. “Hurry, please.”
He sat down beside her and dipped a swab in the antiseptic. Color swept up her throat as he lowered the towel and let it to drop around her waist. He met her gaze. “Is there a problem?”
“For some reason, the ease in which you lowered the towel makes me more aware of my sexuality than when I was totally nude in the shower with you.”
He grinned. “Maybe that’s because I wasn’t naked in the shower with you.”
“You aren’t naked now, either.”
“True, but we’re sitting on a bed together. A bed where we had the most incredible sex I’ve ever had in my life. That might be the problem.”
She blushed again. “Probably.” She released a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and waited.
He arched a brow at her sudden stillness, at the stubborn determination on her face to get through this ordeal. He hesitated, then slowly dabbed the wet swab on the raw scratches across her breasts. He treated the abused nipple with a quick, impersonal touch, biting back his rage at her pain. Beads of perspiration dotted her upper lip by the time he was finished. Tears swam in her eyes, but she hadn’t made a peep.
“Sting?” he inquired gently.
“Yes.”
At her nod, he lowered his head, pursed those wicked lips and blew puffs of cooling air that soothed the sting.
Kaycee’s heart hammered as his breath flowed lightly across her breasts. Her stomach clenched and heat pooled between her thighs. She couldn’t keep her gaze from traveling over his rangy body and appreciating the well-sculpted planes of his face.
His wet shirt clung to his broad chest, plastered like a second skin to his well-toned body. He’d slicked his wet hair back from his face. The thickest eyelashes she’d ever seen on a man, soft as velvet and sinfully long, surrounded his dark eyes.
She swallowed, realized that even though now wasn’t the time and certainly it wasn’t his intention, what he was doing to her was damned erotic. He looked up. Their gazes locked. He must have seen something on her face, in her eyes, something raw and hungry, because his eyes darkened to shards of onyx. He held her attention as he lowered his head and rubbed his mouth against her lips, a brief, butterfly caress, light as fairy dust. It touched her deeper than his most passionate kisses from the night before.