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“Why did you leave?” He wrapped her bare legs around his hips, then fisted his cock and slid it between her slickenedfolds.
“Grant, I…oh God,please.”
“Tell me!” He held himself there, pressed against her but not allowing her to feel him inside her. He was a selfish bastard for making her say it, but something inside him was breaking under the weight of his need to hear the words from her lips. Somewhere deep down in his soul he could sense their world unraveling, and he needed to have this one thing from her before it all fell apart. Gathering her wrists in his other hand, he held them above her head as he devoured her mouth with a punishing kiss, allowing his tongue the pleasure his cock had been momentarilydenied.
She writhed beneath him, struggling against his hold. Her hips canted and bucked, her legs tightening around him as she tried to pull him into her. “Tell me,” he growled as he fought against her attempts, his cock throbbing in his fist as he held himself at bay. “Tell me why youran.”
“You know why!” She released a whimpering sob into his mouth and he pulled back to see the faint glow from the discarded flashlight reflect off the unshed tears in hereyes.
“Say it,Thalia.”
He watched as she shook her head and blinked back her tears, her chest heaving beneath him. “Being in love with you changes nothing. I’m still going to die…ahh…”
Grant’s body bowed against hers as he released his cock and entered her in one long hard thrust, sending sparks dancing along his spine that made his toes curl inside his boots.“Fuuuuck!”This wasn’t about making love. Every molecule in his body raced to claim her.Mine!Every stroke was made with the determination to erase all who had come before him and lay claim to what was now and would forever be his.All…fucking…mine!
“Grant....I…oh, God…ahh…don’t stop!” He couldn’t even if she had begged him. His cock swelled inside her as thrust after thrust, her body coiled tighter and tighter around him. His scalp tingled as his muscles began to burn. Every tendon in his arms and legs strained against his skin as he fought to hold out for one more thrust, then another until everything seized with one last drive, flinging him over the edge as he came deep inside her, filling her over and over as the sound of his own primal cry filled the night air surrounding them.All. Fucking.Mine!
I don’t deserve her.Wrapping her in his arms, he rested his forehead against her shoulder and tried to come to terms with his new reality as she continued to tremble and pant beneath him. She loved him. He had no idea what to do with that concept, or the fact that he was so far gone for her he would never be thesame.
There was one thing he knew for sure. He lifted his head and tilted her face toward his. “You’re wrong, Thalia,” he breathed against her lips. “It changeseverything.”
They lay there panting, their breaths mingling together as he traced the contours of her face with his fingertips, soaking in the similarities to the innocent child he’d seen in that folder full of tragedies. No matter what had happen to her, she’d won. She’d beat them at their own game and would never be broken in hiseyes.
“Grant,” she breathed against his lips. He closed his eyes as her fingers trembled over his brow. “I’m sosorry.”
He pushed himself up and pulled her into his arms, the fear he’d felt for her still fresh and raw, lying just beneath his skin. “Don’t ever run from me again, fossa.” He’d been hell bent on nothing but reddening her ass when he found her, but he was unprepared for the rush of fear and relief he’d felt when he’d finally gotten his hands on her. “So help me woman, if you ever do thatagain…”
Her arms tightened around him. They stood there together in the silent darkness as his body caught up to the knowledge that she was okay. He wasn’t sure he’d satisfied his need to hold her when he felt a shiver run through her thin frame. “Christ, woman. You’refreezing.”
He was such an idiot. Seeing the tattered remains of her shirt on the ground behind her, he pulled his own shirt over his head and handed it to her. “Put that on.” He pulled up his own damn pants and retrieved hers from the ground, shaking them out before he handed them to her. “I’ll collect your boots.” Hell, he’d been in such a frenzy he didn’t even remember removing them. He handed them to her then collected the flashlight and his backpack, reaching into hers to retrieve his satphone.
Flipping it off standby, he scrolled through the call log and bit back a curse when he saw the last dialed number. “You calledJauhar.”
She bit her thumbnail and nodded. “But I didn’t talk to him. One of his men picked up and I…I couldn’t do it. I hung up without sayinganything.”
“Fuck!” Grant pulled up his pant leg and drew the knife from his boot, ignoring the flash of panic that washed over her face when she saw it. “Well, at least you only have half a death wish.” He stepped over to the dead leopard and sat the two backpacks down in the dirt next to theanimal.
“What are you going todo?”
Ignoring her for the moment, he grabbed ahold of one of the big cat’s front legs and rolled it onto its back. With the point of his knife he made a long slit in its skin, straight up the middle of its belly, careful not to cut past the flesh and fur. He pulled the skin away and emptied the carcass of its inner contents. He took the sat phone apart and removed the memory stick which held all the tracking data and then stuffed it and the phone inside theanimal.
“Grant,why…?”
He turned and motioned toward his backpack. “There’s a bottle of water in the outer pocket. Get it and open it up for me.” He held out his hands as she poured the water over them, washing off the traces of the animal’s blood. “If we’re lucky, something bigger then she is will eat the phone whole, and Jauhar’s men will be chasing their asses out here long enough to give us time to get the hell out ofhere.”
“What?” She looked at the cat and then back to him. Even in the darkness he could see her confusion. “How would they know where to findit?”
He reached into his backpack and pulled out the other satellite phone, keying up the GPS locator application. “Same way I found you.” He handed the phone to her and grabbed the bottle of water from her hands. Wiping down his knife, he nodded to the slain leopard. “We need to get moving. The smell of that blood will have this place crawling with scavengers beforedawn.”
He slipped the knife back into its sheath and slung his rifle over his shoulder. Grabbing up his backpack, he handed hers to her and kissed the tip of her nose. The look of shock on her face was almost as entertaining as when she was angry. Almost. “You got yourgun?”
Thalia nodded and took the backpack from his hand. He laughed and shook his head. Yeah, speechless was a damn good look for her. If they weren’t mired in the middle of a shit storm, he might take a few moments to enjoy it. As it was, they’d be lucky to get through the next dayalive.
He took her hand and pulled her past the leopard, further into the brush, holding back a disgruntled groan as she pulled against his hand. “Where are we going? The compound is the otherway.”
“Can’t go back there.” He’d thought about it, but it wasn’t a smart idea. “It’s the only structure within forty miles in any direction. This close to the satellite signal, it won’t take them long to put two and two together and hit thecompound.”
He hated leaving the chopper behind. It would be a hell of a lot quicker and safer than trudging through the brush, but he couldn’t chance that Jauhar hadn’t already closed in on the place. Players like him had men everywhere, forces that could be mobilized and deployed in minutes to almost any location. If they’d been anywhere but out in the middle of nowhere he wouldn’t chance moving out at all, calling in for a pick up instead. As the first bright rays of the sun pierced the early dawn sky, he could already see the buzzards gathering overhead. He might need to do that anyway. Telling her about her father would have towait.
