North Western Australia
The Kimberly
February 8, Evening
Dianna woke to the deafening calls of a variety of parrots and cockatiels and Taylor’s distinctive moans. Late evening shadows settled in around them. Inside the shelter, it remained semi-dark and humid. God, she was sick of the rain, sick of being trapped inside a little bitty hut with barely enough room to turn in her sleep.
The rain beat down relentlessly. She didn’t think it had stopped all day. It was enough to drive anyone nuts! She propped herself on one elbow and checked on Taylor. He’d thrown off her fur coat. Damn! He was shivering. Diana traced her gaze down his bruised and blistered chest. Goose bumps stood up like tiny soldiers marching across a desert. “Taylor?”
Other than a brief flicker of his eyelids, he gave no other response. Getting water down him through the night had proved hopeless. She’d spilled more on him than she’d poured in him. She wished she had something to help reduce the swelling of his tongue.
She grabbed one of the oranges, peeled it, and dribbled juice between his lips. His eyes popped open. He locked his fingers around her wrist and jerked her closer. “You bitch! I told you to slow down. You’ll get us killed driving like that!”
“What?” Dianna blinked. It took her a moment to realize he wasn’t talking to her but to someone who walked across his feverish mind. “It’s okay,” she soothed. “I’ll slow down. I won’t drive fast again.”
He laughed. “You always say that.” He moved so suddenly, Dianna squeaked. Caught off guard by the way he rolled her beneath him, she gasped. “Taylor! Stop it. What are you doing?”
“You want fast. I’ll give you fast. I’ve wanted to do you for a long time.”
“Shit! Taylor, get off me.”
He flipped up her skirt. “I need to get off. You can help me with that.”
“Taylor, stop it! Stop!” She pushed against his heavy body. There was no budging him, no dislodging him off her.
“I wanna fuck you,” he said feverishly. “My God, I’ve wanted you for so long.” He lowered his head, crushed her mouth beneath his.
His lips felt hot and dry and tasted of orange. Oh, God. She didn’t care how hot or dry his lips were, he had the tang of heaven on his mouth. His body felt rock hard and solid on top of her. And oh, so delicious.
Oh, Lordy, she so wanted to cave in, wanted to stop resisting and let him have his way with her. His wide chest flattened her breasts. Yeah, silly her, she’d kept her shirt off as he’d requested. She’d started several times to slip on a clean shirt, but then she’d remembered how he’d said he loved her tits, and she just couldn’t find it in herself to pull on the damn shirt. If he wanted to look at her breasts, then he could look his fill.
The firm length of his hard cock nestled against the damp heat between her thighs. She needed this. It seemed she’d waited for this moment forever. Finally, he was going to make love to her.
She stopped struggling and surrendered to the demand in his kiss, willingly parted her lips and allowed him in. Why fight the inevitable? Why fight what she wanted?
His tongue swept deep, swirling and coaxing a heated response from her. She melted beneath him, dragged her fingers through his thick hair. “I’ve always wanted you, Taylor. I love you.”
“Yeah? You’ve always wanted this.” He slid a finger inside her and groaned against her mouth. “You feel good, wet, warm, ready for me.”
Dianna sighed and wiggled her hips. “I’m so ready for you.”
He grinned, his eyes glinting feverishly. “I know.”
Taylor held his cock, and stroked the hard length.
Dianna groaned. “Maybe we should wait. You’re ill.”
“Honey, I’ve waited long enough. No more waiting. I’m hard. You’re willing. Open for me.”
He didn’t wait for her response but nudged her thighs roughly apart. Without saying another word, he guided the thick head toward her wet channel and sank inside her in one hard thrust.
Dianna flinched. She hadn’t expected him to be quite so rough in his penetration of her.
“Mmm,” he whispered. “God, you’re as hot and tight as I imagined you would be.” He worked his hips like a runaway piston. He moved his cock in and out, in and out, fast, faster, hard, harder, deep, and deeper.
Dianna heard his ragged breaths, felt his body shudder. He buried his shaft deep, clenched his teeth and growled low in his throat. The warmth of his release wet her inside and spilled onto her inner thighs when he pulled out of her. Over in a matter of seconds, she blinked. What the hell had just happened? “No. Wait!” Her body felt incomplete and still needy.
Taylor gave a dry, feverish laugh from the back of his throat. “Too late. Sorry, honey, but I needed you too much to go slow. I’ll make it up to you next time.” He dropped beside her and pulled her into his arms. “Your turn next time, Amy, I promise.” He closed his eyes and sighed. “You felt good. Hot. Tight. Just like every time we fuck. Mmm. Delicious. Night, Amy.”
Dianna blinked. “What? Who am I?”
“Amy?” Taylor shivered. “Damn, it’s freezing in here. You need to reset the controls on the air.”
Her mouth worked, but no words came out. She’d just been fucked by the man she loved, and he had no clue he’d screwed her. Worse, she hadn’t even enjoyed it. Tears welled in her eyes. She sniffed. “Stupid-stupid-stupid!” When was she ever going to learn? She squirmed away from him and wrinkled her nose at the stickiness between her thighs. “Oh, crap!”
Dianna grabbed her bag and dug out the little round case of pills. Her heart sank. She’d missed several doses. Had she missed enough to jeopardize her protection? Quickly, she counted the missed days. Hell, she hadn’t taken any for the month. She’d skipped over a week’s worth of pills. Was that enough to put her at risk for pregnancy? How many could she safely miss?
Numb, she stared at Taylor. What if? She licked her lips. Nah. She was probably still safe.
Taylor. His cheeks looked flushed. His breathing rapid. Sure it was. He’d just had a rowdy round of sex where he was the only participant. She felt his forehead. God, he was burning up.
“Amy,” he whispered her name. “I love you, sweetheart.”
Dianna ignored the tears that burned her eyelids. It wasn’t his fault he didn’t love her. No, he didn’t love her. He loved some faceless bitch named Amy. She glanced at the pills, closed the lid on the compact and tossed the container in her bag. If he didn’t know whom he’d screwed, maybe he wouldn’t remember how easily she’d given into him.
What if he’d just made her pregnant? Her brothers would kill Taylor! Hell, her brothers would kill her!
“Amy? I’m cold. Come here and get me warm.”
“Not in this lifetime,” she snapped.
He frowned, slowly opened his eyes, but it wasn’t her he saw. His blue eyes looked glazed with heat, fever hot, and unseeing. “Are you mad at me? I don’t understand.”
Dianna swiped a tear off her cheek. “I’ll explain it to you when you’re feeling better.”
That seemed to satisfy him. He closed his eyes. “I’m still cold,” he mumbled.
Soon, she heard his soft snores.
Sleep, as usual, didn’t come easy for her.
Chapter Eleven
If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.
~George Bernard Shaw
Western Australia
Damnboola Station
February 8, Sunday
“How rough is the area where they crashed?”
Raider Remington, owner of Damnboola Station, opened the door to the guestroom to his American cousin, Wildorado, used whenever he visited Australia. It had been at least seven years since Wild set foot on Damnboola—too long, as far as Raider was concerned.
Raider wiped a hand across his mouth for lack of something better to do. It was bad enough Dianna had been on her way here to attend his mother’s funeral, and now there might very we
ll be two more funerals. Inside, his body trembled. It had been years since he’d felt such a loss of control over his emotions. He sure as hell hated to give Wild more bad news. Raider hesitated, chewing on his bottom lip.
“It’s all right, Raider. I know it can’t be good. I’m sorry about Aunt Marion.”
“Thanks. At least she didn’t suffer.”
“So how bad is this Kimberly region?”
“Bad. The Kimberly is the hottest part of Australia. We don’t know how far off course Dianna flew. Radar in Broome noted she changed direction several times without informing them. She was all over the screen. They couldn’t raise her on the radio to find out what was happening.”
“How long did she fly off course?”
“At least two hours. Maybe longer.”
“Survival?”
“That will depend on where they crashed. If she strayed very far south or east, they might have gone down in the Great Sandy Desert. It’s hot, dry, uninhabited, and it’s big, over a hundred thousand miles big.”
“Jesus.”
“The Tanami Desert is to the east, and the Gibson Desert lays to the south. It’s a narrow window that they might have missed the deserts and crashed north. But it’s not just the deserts. Worst case scenario, other parts of The Kimberly have a lot of steep-sided mountain ranges. If the plane hit one of those…” His voice trailed off. “You know.”
Wild nodded and swallowed hard. “Yeah. I know.”
“Best case scenario, if they survived the crash, you can’t possibly imagine the problems they’ll face…snakes, spiders, flies, mosquitoes, no food, no water, the heat, the rain. It’s the wet here, monsoons to the north if they crashed there.” Raider paused as Wild’s face paled. “I don’t want to paint a picture of pure gloom and doom. As long as they aren’t seriously injured, depending on where they crashed, they can survive a few days.”
“A few days? How few?”
“Temperatures can reach up to a hundred and eight.”
“How few?”
“A couple of days without water—with it, I don’t know, a week, maybe, but not long. They aren’t prepared for a hike in the Outback or a track through the rainforest. Anything from flash floods to God knows what can catch them unawares. There are hundreds of ways to die in the Outback, and believe me, it’s a death sentence out there for those who have no knowledge how to survive in the wilderness.”
“Dianna spent summers here—”
“Yes. She was a young girl, Wild. Colton and Silver taught her a few basic survival skills, but that was years ago and nothing near the scale of what she’ll need. Who knows what she’ll even remember?”
“Colton and Silver are with the rescue parties?”
“Yes, until the sun goes down. They’re both flying and searching in the northwestern area, which is where her plane should have gone down according to radar. Still, we’re talking thousands of miles. If they spot them, they’ll drop them water and give the location so a chopper can fly in and rescue them, but they have to return tonight for Mom’s funeral tomorrow.”
Wild nodded. “I understand, Raider.”
Wild knew in his heart that Colt and Silver, Raider’s younger brother and sister, would search for as long as they had daylight. They didn’t live at Damnboola. They each had their own stations, but those stations were still part of Damnboola.
“Kissy’s here at the ranch?”
Raider grinned and nodded. “Yeah, she’s pissed at me for not letting her go with Silver, but I…you know.” He shrugged. “She’s a baby yet. I couldn’t bring myself to let her get on the plane.”
“I suppose she’s stubborn as a mule?”
Raider laughed. “For a ten-year-old, she’s about as bullheaded as any Remington ever born and twice as ornery, but I love her. She’s my baby.”
Wild nodded. Raider had never denied Kissy was his daughter. He’d never said she was either, but he’d raised her from birth when Kissy’s mother, Kate Griffith, showed up one day and shoved the baby in Raider’s arms a week after the infant’s birth.
“Take her. She’s yours. I don’t ever wanna see her or you again.” Those were the only words Kate said to Raider before she turned and walked away. She’d never returned to the station. There was no doubt Kissy was pure Remington. She had the Remington’s lanky frame and lazy walk and Raider’s deep blue eyes.
The child sounded like Silver when she laughed and talked. She adored the man she called Dad, but Wild had his doubts Raider was her father. He leaned more in the direction of Raider’s father having an affair with Kate.
Rufus Remington cheated on Marion plenty of times over the years, right up until he was killed by a wild bull nine years earlier. Wild figured Raider claimed Kissy as his daughter to keep his mother from being hurt and embarrassed once again.
Wild admired his cousin for his sense of duty and closed-mouth approach to the situation.
“You wanna talk about it?” Raider parked his lanky frame on the side of the bed. “Now don’t go getting that closed up look on your face, cousin. It doesn’t take a genius to know that a man with your looks probably caught hell in prison.”
Wild eyed him with the same regard he gave most lawmen—respectful, but aloof. He didn’t let emotion sway him. He slid his gaze away and shrugged. “I figure if you had any more information about the crash and rescue, you’d tell me.”
“Wasn’t talking ‘bout Dianna and that man she has with her. Nothing new ‘bout the plane crash I can tell you. Officials are searching. They’ll let us know as soon as they have something. I meant do you wanna talk ‘bout your time in prison?”
“You wanna talk about Kissy and who her real father is?”
Raider clamped his jaw shut.
“Nope. Didn’t think so.” Wild tossed his two duffle bags on the bed and scowled. “Look, I know you just wanna help, but the only thing I’m willing to discuss is how the rescue search for Dianna and Taylor is proceeding. I don’t do polite conversation. Not anymore. I sure as hell don’t want to share the misery of life behind bars.”
Raider settled his icy blue gaze on him. “Prison was hell, huh?”
Wild shifted uncomfortably. “I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but I’m not here to discuss what happened to me there. It’s done. Can’t be undone. I lived through it. Time to move on.”
“Done, maybe, but not finished.”
“It’s finished…for now.”
“Yep. Thought so. You look for trouble, you’ll find it.” Raider had a habit of talking about as slow as he walked. A tall, lean man made of long bone and tough sinew, he rarely lost his temper, hardly ever smiled, and he tended to be about as wary of females as Wild was of conversation.
“Don’t think I don’t know that little gal lied ‘bout what happened. I knew it from the moment she opened her pretty little mouth and started talking. That gal was damned jealous of you paying attention to Pam Summers and not her.”
Wild smothered a groan. He really didn’t want to discuss the lies Jayla Ross told that day in court. “I hear you have a problem with a new neighbor. Some female named Sabrina Holden, who happens to hold the best water rights around, and her property sets smack in the middle of Damnboola? This gonna be a problem for you?”
Wild figured he’d neatly turned the table on Raider. Raider was a lot like him. He didn’t usually invite words and had less to say.
Raider coughed and scratched his chin. “Different kind of trouble. Let’s just say I have her lined up in my crosshairs. I’m gonna bring that lady down before this battle between us is finished.”
Wild’s lips twitched. “Spoken like a true Remington.”
Raider snorted. “True Remington or not, you got a lot of rage churning inside you, cousin. Those skeletons rattling round inside you are gonna keep right on dancing until you turn them loose.”
“The only day I’ll ever let go will be the day after I make Jayla Ross pay for her lies.”
“Have you seen her since gett
ing out of prison?”
“Nope. Her family moved away right after I was sentenced.”
“She came forward and finally told the truth, though, got you out of the prison she got you sent to.”
Wild nodded. “You think that makes up for the loss of my good name or for the five years I lost or for what happened in prison?”
“I didn’t say that, only that she tried to make things right for you.”
“She’ll never make things right.”
“Not until you get her in your crosshairs?”
“Like you, I’m bringing her down.”
“Just be sure of what you do. I know you feel you owe her.”
“Yeah, I owe her. She was a spoiled, selfish, homely little brat back then, and since her daddy is now a senator from Virginia, she’s likely worse.”
“Step-daddy.”
“What?”
“Yeah. Hamilton Ross isn’t her real dad. He adopted her when he married Jayla’s mother. Jayla was twelve.”
“How the hell do you know all this?”
“When you were on trial, I hired a private investigator to check out the Ross family.”
“Jesus. I had no idea. Why did you do such a thing?”
“Because I knew she was lying. I wanted to know her motivations. Know her better.”
“Did you learn anything?”
“Not anything I could prove.”
“But?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t like the smell, you know? Hamilton came out of it squeaky clean, but I don’t care much for tidy white. It stinks. We all have dancing skeletons. Her mother died in a very mysterious accident about two years ago, just about the time Jayla came forward and confessed her lies.”
“Jayla’s mother?”
“Yeah. Her car went over a cliff.”
“Jesus Christ.”
“Jayla was in the car with her. She was flung clear, but the girl nearly died. Her spleen was torn and her skull fractured. She was in a coma for weeks.”
“So you’re telling me she paid for her crimes against me already?”
“No. I’m saying be sure of what you want.”
“Why?”
Too Close To The Fire/Too Hot To Handle (Montana Men 3) Page 10