AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Shell take care of him. Shes right. Hes better off, and I dont belong here.
Collecting her clothes, she fled like the coward she knew she was.
* * * * *
She kept her head down and her pace sedate until she got to the outskirts of the carnival grounds. Then she took the quickest route outside the lights. She needed darkness, anonymity, even from herself. Once there, she shed the body suit and put her dress back on. Then she ran. She had to outdistance the feeling in her chest that threatened to choke her, and needed to feel the earth, the cool grass, under her feet. Once she ran out of breath, shed find the path to the chapel Tyler had on his estate. These past couple days, shed occasionally gone there to sit in the front pew and watch the inlet water flow outside the large picture window. Shed stay there until things quieted down, at dawn. Like vampires, the carnival goers slept at daylight, coming back in the late afternoon for festivities to start again. Guess they understood as well as anybody that the darkest pleasures werent as pleasurable under the harsh light of reality and daylight. Maybe shed sleep in the chapel until then, watch the sunrise pour through the stained glass windows.
She pushed herself harder, harder, not caring which direction she headed now, just so it was away from the lights, from the feelings she couldnt face, from the overwhelming sense of failure. Shed wanted him, but shed wanted to hurt him more, and there was no way she could tell him that.
God, she was too fucked up for anyone anymore.
She yelped, startled, as she was caught around the waist and swung around, so abruptly her head snapped back and vertigo sent her mind spinning. She crumpled against Brendan and went down in a tangled heap with him. Shed known it was him the second he touched her. She shoved against him, though, because she wanted him to hold her so much she couldnt afford to let him do it. Instead, he simply shifted so he was sitting with her cradled securely between his thighs and inside the span of his arms.
No, he said. I wont let you go. I wont.
His voice was strained and determined, his body solid and strong, and she couldnt fight him. She held stiff against him for all of two heartbeats, then she melted. His breath went out in a sigh, and she thought she heard a soft good girl before he pressed a kiss against her hair.
He must have sprinted like an Olympian to catch up with her after they let him down. Hed tugged on a pair of jeans from somewhere, though his upper body was still blissfully bare.
So have you thought of a career as a track star? she asked, at a loss.
I was afraid youd fall. When he gently touched her chin, he directed her attention to what was ahead. A s she blinked in the dim light thrown by a mere slice of moon, she realized what shed thought was a continuation of the natural area was in reality the bulkhead to the water. If shed run across it, she would have tumbled six feet down, into the inlets high tide current.
Ouch. She drew a shaky breath. I guess I wasnt really looking.
No. I thought you werent. His arms tightened around her. Chloe, you didnt do anything wrong. You know that, right? Whatever you want to do, or dont want to do, is acceptable here. You didnt need to run. You could have just said it wasnt your thing and let me down.
The problem was she had wanted to do it, but in a way that had frightened her. She couldnt say that, though, because hed need her to explain it, and she couldnt explain it to herself. It was like she was carrying a demon inside her and only her continued silence would keep it contained.
Rather than answering, she slid her arms under his, banding them over his back, and held on, pressing her face into his chest.
Its all right, he murmured, stroking her hair. Just relax for me, all right? Well just sit here. Thats all thats needed.
She nodded, and let him comfort her, savored how his hands felt, sliding up and down her back, the way he caressed her nape as he fondled her short curls, the rough lullaby of words rumbling unintelligibly through his chest. In time, her heart rate settled, and she could hear the water, the breeze through the trees, and the sounds from the carnival behind them. Laughter, the occasional rift of music and perhaps a cry of pleasure.
Her body tightened anew as she caught a mental scent of it, reminding her how revved up shed been before her emotions had derailed her.
Her fingers had gone from a functional kneading of his back to a questing slide over the muscles, down toward the loose waistband, where she found he wasnt wearing anything but the jeans. His five oclock shadow rasped against her cheek as he nudged her head back against his shoulder and settled his mouth over hers. He didnt have to coax her lips apart, her mouth opening to his heat, the glide of his tongue over hers, the way he seduced her body to arched response with nothing more than that movement. His arms tightened around her so her breasts pressed harder against his chest and he cupped her skull, holding her in the kiss until she was moaning softly in his mouth, her fingers back to kneading, only now it was a spasmodic reflection of the yearning emptiness between her legs.
Easy, he said softly, drawing his mouth away to her cheek, over to her ear, nuzzling it and teasing the shell with the tip of his tongue, before pressing his mouth to the sensitive part of her throat below. Its all easy.
Like the flow of the inlet behind them, inevitable but nothing forced. One part of her was soothed and rocked like a baby to a still peace, while her body hummed with a womans fully awake libido.
I have an idea, he said against her brow.
So do I. Several.
He chuckled, passed a hand down her hip to her thigh, tracing her flesh through the skirt to her knee, creating a ticklish circle that made her squirm and realize he wasnt at all uninvolved when he stifled an amused curse. Looking up at him, she slid her hand between them and put the heel of it on his erect cock beneath the jeans, rubbing deliberately as she held his gaze. I want this. I really do.
It makes me even harder to hear you say it. Do you feel it?
She gave him a nod, but she moved her hands to his chest, resting them there with a faint quiver in her fingers. This was good, this feeling, and she didnt want to lose it. She also didnt want to worry about where to go from here. She wanted him to do that. Whats your idea?
He pressed his lips together, a gratifying expression of near pain at the removal of her touch, but managed to give her another smile. Id like to enjoy the carnival with you. The traditional parts of it. Just as we would if we were in town.
So you wouldnt be mine anymore? She thought of Mistress Lyda of the perfect silver eyes and any-man-is-my-slave boots.
Chloe, I was already yours.
