Unstoppable Force (Force of Nature Series) (8 page)

He tore her from his neck and took her
mouth. Lou had been kissed before. A quick peck on the mouth from someone she’d
known, but nothing like this. When his hand slid down her body and cupped her
ass, pulling her tight to him, she threw back her head and moaned loudly.

His cock was hard against her. Moving
her feet, she could feel him in her folds, could almost feel him enter her. His
growl made her want more from him, everything from him. He lifted her up and
moved her back. The wall behind her was hard and cold; the man in front of her
was hard and hot.

She wanted to wrap herself around him. Wanted
to feel him touch her skin, nip at her flesh, and take her. When she lifted her
leg he held her up that way as he rocked into her. She was so close to
something that she lifted her other leg without thinking.

He tore from her when she cried out. When
she started to fall forward, the pain in her leg so intense, she knocked his
hands away when he tried to catch her. He simply lifted her into his arms and
took her to the cot.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for it to go
that far here.”

She looked up at him, the pain in her
leg forgotten momentarily.

“I meant to take you home first then
mate with you so you wouldn’t be able to leave me.”

“Really?” her voice dripped with
sarcasm. There was no way he could have missed it, but apparently he had.

“Yes. If we mate then you will have to
stay with me. You’ll also not be able to harm me. We’ll be a couple.”

Lou struggled to get off his lap. As
soon as her feet hit the floor, she moved to the other side of the cell. It was
that or strangle him. She stiffened when he stood as well. “You say once we’re
mates or whatever then I won’t be able to harm you.”

He nodded.

“But for now I can. I wouldn’t come any
further if I were you.”

He stopped and grinned at her. She was
sure that had worked on other women, but she, he would soon discover, was not
other women. He took one then another step forward.

“Now, Lou honey. You know as well as I
do that we can’t not let this happen between us. This is much bigger than
either of us can—”

As soon as his head hit the floor she
stepped over him and out of the cell.
Bigger my ass
, she thought as she
went out of the labyrinth of halls in the sub level of the jail. Stopping at
the desk, she asked if she was free to go and left. She started to tell the man
at the desk about Connor, but thought he’d come around soon enough.

Chapter 7

Connor was pissed. He pulled into the
compound, tires throwing rock and dust everywhere. He was out of his truck
before the engine died completely. His mother was standing on the front porch
when he stepped onto the first step.

“You won’t go into this house with that
much anger.” She held her ever present spoon in front of her like a shield. “I
won’t have you going to her mad like you are.”

“She fucking hit me.” He flushed when
she raised her brow. “She hit me in the head and left me on the floor to…to who
knows what. Am I supposed to just let her do that and get by with it? I’m her
mate, damn it.”

“She told me what you said to her.”

He frowned. He’d not said anything bad
to her.

“You actually told her that you were
going to mate with her to keep her in line? Connor Force, what is wrong with
you?”

He hadn’t said that. Had he? He tried to
think of what he’d said. “I told her that she’d not be able to harm me once we
were mated. And that’s the truth.” The tapping foot made him try to think
harder. “I also told her that she’d not be able to leave me.”

“And that is the most romantic thing you
could say to a woman who spent three days in the hospital then a day in a cell?
Mate with me so you have to come to heel.”

Connor started to glare at her and
thought better of it. That fucking spoon hurt when she caught you between the
eyes like she did. He looked up at the second floor to the pack house where he
knew she was. “She’s not cooperating with me.” He sat on the step and put his
head in his hands. “She doesn’t want anything to do with me either. How am I
supposed to protect her when she keeps running away?”

He felt his mom sit next to him and put
her arm around him. “I know you read her file. You know what she’s been up against.
And Austin told you she had trust issues. What do you think you’d do if she
told you something for your own good? Like for instance, ‘stay here,’ or ‘do as
I say?’ You wouldn’t like it any better than she does. Would you?”

He shook his head. “But she’s hurt. And
in a great deal of pain. How am I supposed to just let her go about her way
when I know she can barely walk?”

“You just do. She’s not your run of the
mill girl, Connor. She has abilities more profound than yours. She can’t shift,
but…can you imagine what she finds out when she touches someone? Can you even
begin to think what she gets from anyone when she comes into contact with them?
Connor, she knows everything there is to know about all of us even without us
telling her.”

He looked beyond the yard to the woods. He’d
never thought of her knowing his mind. He knew what she could do, or at least
what the file said she could do, but not anything more. He glanced at his mom. “She
doesn’t trust me because I’ve given her no reason to. I’ve been bullying her
since she came into my life. And me into hers.” His mom patted him on the back
and stood. “How do you know? How do you know that she’s…what?”

“Overwhelmed? Look around you, Connor. There
are over a thousand people here. How many of them do you think have touched her
in some way? Brushed against her? Touched something she touches? She’s been on
her own for many years living out of trash cans and dumpsters. How many less
people has she come in contact with up until now?”

Connor heard his mom go into the house
as he continued to sit on the step. Overwhelmed. He’d been doing that to her as
well. Lou had been in constant contact with someone since she’d been found in
the woods. Connor stood up. He had to make it right with her. But first, he had
something he needed to do.

He got into his truck and went into
town. A man with the kind of money he had could make things happen much quicker
than one who didn’t. And Connor wanted to make things happen. The first stop
had been to the construction company that was working on his home. The next few
were to get things to overwhelm his pretty mate in a positive way.

Connor arrived back at the compound
late. The house wasn’t completely dark, but he knew that most of the people
inside were in bed. He entered the house through the kitchen and wasn’t really
surprised to see CJ there. She was working on something and looked up at him
when he cleared his throat.

“I was making her a chart. I know she
hasn’t been introduced to a lot of us yet, but I thought a sort of pecking
order might help her out. I know it would have me.”

He glanced down at the sheet and nodded.
“She could probably use it, but wait before giving it to her. I need to…I want
to…” He sat down in the chair and held his packages to his chest. “I’m trying
to woo her.”

CJ put out her hand and he gave her two
of the bags. “This is nice. What made you think to get her this?”

It was one of those reader things. He’d
seen her reading when he’d been in the room a couple of times, and when he’d
gone to the jail, she had four or five books open and spread on the floor under
the bed. He told CJ this.

“She’ll love it. It’s much easier to
carry around than a book sometimes. I have one by the bed. And I have stories
on it that I read the twins at night.” She handed it back to him as she opened
the next bag.

This one had been the hardest to figure
out. He’d never bought women’s clothes before and he hadn’t a clue what size
she wore. But when CJ held it up, he could see that it was silly and reached
for it.

“I love these, Connor. And she will too.
Oh my, but they’re so soft.” The jammies in her hand looked as much. “You did
well with these.”

She put them back in the bag, but not
before she rubbed them on her cheek again. Connor flushed and handed her the
next two bags. The last bag was stuff he’d keep to himself. CJ smiled over the
box of dark chocolates and grinned at him over the strawberries and cream.

“Mom said she wasn’t eating well. I
thought fruit would help her regain her strength.” He dropped his head as he
put them back in the bag. CJ’s laughter was soft and he was embarrassed. “I
just want her to get better.”

“Of course you do. We all do. She’s very
hurt.” He looked up at her. “I don’t just mean her body, but her heart as well.
I know just what she feels like to be rejected by a parent and both of hers did
it to her. Poor girl.” She turned back to him once more. “And Connor? You have
to be honest with her. She won’t…she deserves nothing less than that.”

He nodded as she left the room. CJ had
gone through a lot and he had forgotten about that. He moved toward the stairs
and thought about how best to approach Lou. He grinned when he thought with armor
plating might be best.

~~~

She heard him walking up the stairs. The
house creaked a great deal and she wondered if anyone else was aware of it. She
turned to him in mid pace when he opened the door behind her. He had his hands
full and she started toward him when she noticed that he was smiling at her.

It was the most beautiful thing she’d
ever seen. She tried to remember the last time anyone had ever smiled at her
when not making fun of her or worse. She took a step back when he shut the door
behind him with his foot.

“I got some things for you. Nothing
much. I just noticed that my shirts were a little big on you and thought you’d
like something softer to wear to bed.” He handed her one of the bags. “The lady
at the store said that they were warm too.”

She took the bag from him and pulled out
the bright pink fuzzy pajamas. When she put them close to her cheek, she looked
at him. He was busy with another one of the bags and motioned for her to come
closer.

“You didn’t have to do this. I’m just
fine sleeping in the other shirt I own.” She moved closer, but not enough where
he could touch her. “You should save your money for someone else.”

He laughed and handed her a box. “It’s a
reader thing. There are some books on it. Mostly classics because they came
with it for free. But I had the man at the bookstore set you up with an
account. You can download…I think he said seventy-five books, on it according
to the gift card that came with it. Anything you’d like. Myles has been reading
this book by a vampire friend of Phil’s. I guess you might like those too.”

“Why?” He looked at her with that smile
again. She tried her best to ignore it and asked again. “Why are you suddenly
being nice to me?”

“I should have been nice to you from the
beginning. But I was an ass instead.” She nodded and he laughed again. “You
could say that I’m turning over a new leaf.”

“I don’t want you to turn over anything
for me. I need to get going on this sentence so I can move on.” She put the
things on the dresser next to her and ran her fingers over the soft material
again before she continued. “I won’t do whatever it is you want me to do. I
wouldn’t do it for him and I won’t do it for you.”

“Touch me.” She took a step back when he
advanced toward her. “You can see the future, right? Then touch me and tell me
what you see between us. What I can do for you.”

She laced her fingers together behind
her and took another step back. “No. I won’t. You’ve no idea what it does
to…you have no idea what happens to people when I touch them. They feel…the
connection is very strong.”

“I trust you. Very much.” He was close
enough that she could feel his heat and when he put his hands on her arms, she
shivered from the contact. “Do you just use your hands, or something else, to
make contact?”

“My hands. But I won’t do it. It’s…I’m
not a parlor act.” He smiled bigger. She wanted to tell him to stop that, but
he was leaning into her neck now and licking her throat. “You have to quit
that. It’s not…it’s not fair.”

“But you taste delicious to me. I can
smell your arousal. Do you know what it does to me?” He nipped at her skin. “Tell
me what it makes you feel like when I do this to you.”

“Please.” Her hands were suddenly in
front of her and she was close to touching him. “I know what you are. All of
you. You won’t be able to hide anything from me. I’ll…” He licked her pounding
pulse. “I’ll…please stop, I can’t think.”

He pulled his head up from her shoulder
and looked at him. His eyes were the same warm brown that they had been the
night she’d begged him to kill her. Without thought as to what she was doing to
either of them she touched his face with both hands.

The memories came first. His father
dying, his mother crying a great deal. Fights with his brothers, his first
change. She found his first love, his first sexual encounter. There were
teenage drunken runs though the fields, as well as sex with a she-wolf. His
happiness at making his first thousand dollars then his million. He had even
made his first five hundred million and no one but him, and now her, knew about
it. Then as the memories grew older, he grew older, as well as his family. The
boys that had come to live with them, Reid and Randy, and his talk with them
about sex and women. She laughed when the older boy embarrassed Connor when
he’d asked about masturbation. Then she saw his thoughts of her, of them. The
house that he was building with her in mind. The care he was taking to make it
special for her. She knew she was coming to the end of the now time when she
saw what he’d purchased in the last bag. Then things changed.