DarkPrairieFire (6 page)

“Silly?” He asked, a little too enthusiastically. “No. I think this is dead serious. I want to know everything about you. Even your darkest secrets.”

He rounded to one side of me, like a panther in a cage beginning its paces. I jerked when he reached out and cupped my breasts, quickly increasing his pressure until it burned.

“Maybe you like these ripe beauties to be worshiped even more? Or maybe you want to see them lined with rope, carefully layered across that smoking little body until you can't move a muscle?”

I shuddered, pushing up into his hands. The idea held a certain sultry appeal, but it wasn't even close to what I was after.

And Ethan sensed it. He lifted his hands at once.

They returned to my body as he leaned over me, one on each side, caressing my curves from my armpits all the way to my soft thighs.

When he reached my hips, he tightened his strokes. Ethan stared into my eyes and raised his eyebrows.

“Is it this, little Cat? This plump, sweet ass of yours? Do you want my cock filling it, bulging and shooting into your deepest places, marking the last virgin part of you?”

My eyelids fluttered. I felt heat rise up as he studied me.

Damn it. He's getting awfully close now, but not close enough...

“Any part of me is yours,” I said, exhaling and fighting to steady my tone. Maybe if he walked away convinced that all I wanted was anal play, I wouldn't have to reveal my crazy thoughts, the kind of high risk needs that could threaten our budding relationship.

“No, that isn't it either. I see you like the idea – but not with the kind of sweet rush I like to see when I've captured a woman's fantasies. You aren't squirming like that. Help me out here, Cat. What do you
need
most?”

I smiled shyly and shook my head. The playful laughter that spilled out of my mouth seemed to irritate him.

Ethan reaches across my thigh with one hand, wedging it between my slick labia. His hard fingers reached for my clit, found it, and pinched.

I squirmed, dangerously amused by his rough grip. For the hundredth time, he'd put me in a delicate balance once again, catapulting me to some strange zone in between pain and ecstasy.

Here, there was nothing but pleasurable fire – a weakened, tame kind that could only burst into a searing conflagration if its master willed it to.

“Tell me, Cat. Tell me everything, or I might have to spank this tasty little button.”

“I want you deep inside me,” I moaned, bending my knees as far as the ropes would let me. “No fucking condom, baby. I want it deep and natural.”

I coughed, silently cursing myself as I watched a tight lipped smile spread across his face.

“Finally, we're getting somewhere. And I bet you want me to
come
inside you too, don't you, Cat?

You want my bare cock to pour its molten steel into you, striking something beautiful in your forge, a little gift for you and I?”

My lips opened in a pleasurable grimace. He'd released my clit, shallowly orbiting it as he increased his pressure.

I'd been exposed. Rather than feeling mortified, I felt a massive weight lift off me, and the new emptiness could only be occupied by one thing.

I came hard. Vigorous energy slithered up my back, biting in my brain stem like a sudden shock.

My body lurched and I kicked in his hands. Ethan rubbed harder, drawing his face to my breasts to suckle and nip, sending me careening into that abyss I loved so well.

Even in the ropes and his arms, I swore I was floating. The sky above me opened in dense fire, and the only sounds in that hot, silent place were screams of pure pleasure.

Slowly, haltingly, I recovered. His hands weren't pressed in my aching cleft anymore, but gently wrapped around my body.

Ethan had climbed up on the bed, right between my legs, while I was deep in bliss. His pants were off and he was naked.

“I can give you what you want, little Cat. Maybe not tonight, but soon. Let's have a taste of your desire, sticky and sweet. Let's taste it together.”

Before I could answer, he covered me in a fiery kiss. My wet mound arched up and felt his naked erection.

His body shifted over me, covering me, giving no time for second thoughts as he wedged it at my opening. He slid into me without a condom.

The realization almost left me senseless. With only a few jerks and a grand explosion, he had the power to get me pregnant, and there was nothing I could do about it.

I imagined my belly growing with his seed, his essence, conquering me from the inside out.

The raw heat the visions brought my blood swelled everything. My lips, my nipples, my

clit...everything was on fire.

I stretched my legs wide for him, until the black ropes tugged angrily at my feet. Having the rubber skin stripped away made an incalculably awesome difference.

He penetrated deep, letting the swollen head of his bulge tease the opening to my womb. I sucked in his breath as we kissed, wishing I could melt into him, sticky and oozing together at both openings.

The bed springs sang loudly as we rocked together, drunk on our cocktail of love and risk. I didn't think his deep strokes could feel even better than before – but then I hadn't had him or any other man bare before.

Ethan thundered on, grunting as he buried himself in my wet softness, thundering with every thrust and snorting like an animal. He wrapped his hands beneath me, clawing at my ass, pulling me onto his rigid shaft.

Holy shit. He isn't giving me any choice. He's going to shoot off deep inside me, and I'm going to
have his baby.

His baby...

The pleasurable thought made me wince. It was all too much.

Our loins smashed together in harder, faster strokes. I swallowed him all the way to his heavy balls, feeling his neat crop of pubic hair grinding against my clit.

The delectable friction went several orders beyond any heat I'd ever known. He rampaged faster, wildly tearing at me from the inside out, setting my deepest nerves ablaze like a vast forest fire.

I came, alarmed at the way my body sucked so violently at his erection. Somehow, it knew exactly what it wanted, and how close it was to taking his seed.

Ethan screamed with me. “You're...you're so fucking
tight!
What is this?”

His voice hitched and he punched into me one last time. I don't know how he pulled out just in time.

My rolling eyes cracked open and saw him scream, foaming with reluctant pleasure. He gripped his cock in one fist and held it above my mound.

Oh, no. He's leaving me when he was so close. He's still got his reason while I've been reduced to
carnal madness...

His seed sprayed out in rushing jets, a torrent of burning cream. The jets hurtled across my stomach, landing on my breasts. And they kept coming and coming, as if they were synced to my own climax's intense waves.

It was only as the pleasure dissipated that I felt the terrible burn in my limbs. I'd really done a number on myself fighting the restraints.

I collapsed in a tired heap. Ethan wasn't far behind, but he held himself up, sliding off the bed and wandering across the room for a wipe to clean me up.

“Did you really mean what you said?” I asked. My wrists flexed happily as soon as he freed my hands.

“I'm not the kinda guy who says what he doesn't mean. One of these days, I
will
get you pregnant Cat. You're not the only one who's itching for a baby in these parts. Good women are hard to find out here in the country. And beautiful, perfect women – well, that's another story altogether.”

Outside, the humid morning air reminded me of his kiss. The long walk had drenched my jeans and panties in sticky wetness, and not just from my body desperately cooling itself.

I remembered our sex, how close we'd come to making what any normal person would've thought was a terrible mistake. But to me, in that moment, I wanted his baby more than anything in the world.

It was
right
to me. I didn't care what the rest of the world thought.

I steeled myself as I rounded the spot near Pa's memorial. The silvery cross had sunken sadly into the moist soil.

My heart grew heavy, and I moved quickly toward it, intending to straighten things up. But as I got closer, I soon noticed it wasn't just the cross that was out of place.

A bleached white object with a tiny hat sat beneath the sunken cross. My stomach did a loop, and I bent myself to catch my knees when I was only a couple feet away.

There was no mistaking it. Someone had thrown the heavy skull of a cow near his grave, and capped it with a miniature straw hat – the very same shape and color he used to wear.

I turned into the weeds near the side of the road and heaved.

I didn't lose my breakfast, but I came dangerously close. Thank God for small favors.

What the hell is going on here? What kind of savage fucking lunatic would do something like this?

My nausea waned, replaced by seething anger. I aimed my boot and kicked the skull as hard as I could.

The new boots were thick enough to block out any pain, but I felt the harsh recoil through my leather.

The big mass of bone rolled a few inches, tipping its hat to the ground.

“Pa...God, I'm so sorry.”

My hands dove into the mud. I felt for the base of the cross and struggled to get a grip. Finally, it began to rise, catching the faint sunlight straining its way through the clouds.

When it had grown several inches, I stood, satisfied for now. The skull – the warning? – lay halfway on its side.

Sighing, I picked it up, despising the leaden weight in my hands. I retreated to the house and dropped it in the garbage can outside.

Back in the kitchen, using pumice soap to strip the dirt off my hands, my knees buckled. I grabbed for a towel to dry my hands, but ended up using it to blot away the uncomfortable sweat pouring off my throbbing head.

I barely made it over to a chair near the table before I collapsed. It was like some evil spirit had sucked all my energy, leaving me a walking shell of a woman.

Shell shocked,
I thought, recalling the term from a European history class I'd taken to satisfy an arts requirement in college.

Widespread panic attacks among soldiers in the First World War had made psychologists sit up and take notice for the first time.

It's okay. You need to breathe.

It took nearly a full half hour before I could rise again. When I was on my feet, I leaned across the table, reaching for the phone.

I started to dial the police, but stopped halfway through. Lips tense, I slammed it back into its place, only to pick it up again several seconds later.

The man I needed to deal with this didn't wear a uniform or keep regular hours. Ethan answered after about ten rings. I smiled, knowing he was probably sleeping in a little after our long night together.

“Ethan, it's me,” I said, the stutter in my voice betraying me right away. “Something's happened. I really, really need you to come over here and take a look at this.”

V: Survival Instinct

I'd never seen him so angry before. As soon as he looked at the skull grinning in the dark garbage can, he flushed red, fished it out, and hurled it at the cement steps leading up to my house.

The bone clattered loudly to the ground with a new hole punched in its side. I patted his shoulders cautiously, urging him to take deep, slow breaths.

Jesus. And here I thought I was the one who needed calming down.

“What's up with you, baby? Why are you acting like this?”

“You can't stay here now,” he said simply, grabbing my hand and leading me inside. “Sit down.”

We plopped down at the kitchen table, staring across at one another. He must've seen the messy confusion in my eyes, just as I saw the inexplicable outrage lighting up his.

“If I were you, Cat, I'd call up my closest relatives and pay them a visit for a good, long while. This isn't good. This isn't good at all.” He unfolded his hands and cut through the air, giving added emphasis to words that really felt like overkill.

“That's crazy!” I burst out. “I can't leave this place now that things are finally running. And with all that money up there –“

“Yeah, the money. I'd bet every dime to my name that it's the number one reason you had this skull show up on your poor father's site. They know it's here somewhere, and they will be back.”

“Okay, Ethan. I need you to tell me right now who
they
are. What the fuck is going on here?” I stopped, balling my hands into fists and not unclenching them until I filled my lungs completely full of sorely needed oxygen.

“There's active drug runners around here. Some cartel or something that's using nice, out of the way places like this as a staging ground on the last leg of their trip up to Canada.” He paused, watching my face wrinkle.

“Damned police won't admit to it. It's been like this for a couple years now. I wanted to say something sooner, but you were still reeling from your Pa's death.” He looked up, eying my face cautiously.

I exhaled sharply. Part of me, I knew, should've been angry.

Or at least irked that the one man who could've given me all the information after Pa's murder hadn't been totally forthcoming. But then, he had a good point.

I shook my head slowly. It was a lot to take it.

“I'm not mad. I just need to know what you do. Please, tell me the rest. All of it.”

“There isn't much more to know. I bought myself a newer shotgun last winter. The cold months are pretty dead for them – they don't come around. But as soon as Spring hits, the bastard are back, and I'll be damned if I'm gonna end up like Mister Nichols.”

“I'm not either. And I'm not leaving!” I slammed my fist onto the table, reinforcing my determination the only way I knew how.

“I don't want you to go, little Cat. God, I don't.” He took off his hat, running one hand over his forehead through the short crop of hair. “But you aren't safe here. Hate to point out the obvious, but your Pa was involved with those bandits somewhere along the line.”