Heart of the Hunter (35 page)

She was stunned. I’d told her all of this in the diner already but it was still sinking in. She still didn’t fully believe what was happening. I didn’t blame her. It was a lot to comprehend. She sat down on the bed. I wanted to sit next to her, to tell her it was all going to work out, that we’d live a happy life together, but I couldn’t. The truth was more important. And the truth was that I was riding out to my death in the morning.

And before I did, I was going to exact my price from her. She would carry my child.

I’d told her she’d regret ever laying eyes on me. I’d told her I’d bring her nothing but pain and regret. I wasn’t kidding. I meant every word.

She was shaking her head.

“You said you had brothers.”

“We’re a brotherhood. I call them my brothers, but we’re not related.”

“Jackson,” she said, “we need to talk.”

I shook my head. “The time for talking’s done, Faith. The time for talking was last night, before I put a bullet in that Los Lobos thug.”

“I don’t want you to die, Jackson. I don’t want you to risk your life, even if it’s for my safety. I couldn’t bear it if you didn’t come back.”

I leaned down to her and took her face in my hands. “Listen to me very carefully, Faith. The truth is, I’m happy to do this. If I can give my life to help someone as beautiful as you, it will be worth the sacrifice. And if I can go to my grave knowing that there’s even a chance that you’re carrying my child, that’s a death I can face with courage and honor.”

She looked at me, and I could tell she was hearing what I said. I know I’m crazy. I know there’s not a woman in the world who would want to hear the words I was saying. But there was a strange, masculine logic to it, and she could see that.

A life for a life. That’s how it is for a man. It’s simple. It adds up.

“How do you know?” she said.

“How do I know what?”

“How do you know I’m the one. How do you know I’m the one you want to give your life for? How do you know I’m the woman you want to raise your child?”

I put my mouth on hers and I kissed her. Our tongues met and entwined.

“I just know,” I said, and left the room.

Chapter 12

Jackson

T
HERE WAS A HIGH-POWERED RIFLE
with a scope in the den and I got it and a box of cartridges. I rode down into the sweltering heat of the valley. About four miles down I took a dirt trail leading to some hills. I found a position on an overlook and waited.

It was thirty minutes before a group of deer entered my field of view. They were almost a thousand yards out but I wanted to test the rifle. It was the gun I’d use to kill Wolf Staten.

I loaded a cartridge and held up my hand to judge the wind. There was a slight easterly breeze. I adjusted my sights, making sure there weren’t any gusts or lifts on the valley floor. I breathed slowly but steadily, holding the largest deer in my crosshairs. I put my finger on the trigger.

With the naked eye, the deer was scarcely a dot among the chaparral in the distance. Through the sight, I was so close I felt I could touch him. I could see him breathe. I could make out the faint white marking beneath his left eye. I trained my sights on the artery in his neck, just above the shoulder blade. It would be an instant death.

I exhaled and depressed the trigger.

He didn’t even hear the shot when the bullet struck. The other deer pranced and ran, darting across the valley like fish in a reef. My target hit the ground, a small cloud of dust rising around him.

My father died without a grandson. Faith was my destiny. I hadn’t asked for her. She’d come into that bar and offered herself. I was going to give my life for her. That made her mine.

When I got back to the safe house, all I could think about was putting my semen in her womb.

“Faith,” I called.

“In here,” she said from the bedroom.

I entered, and my eyes grew when I saw how beautiful she looked. I swear to God I’ve never seen anything more enticing. She’d washed her hair and it was wet on her shoulders. Her skin was moist from her bath. She was clean and perfumed.

She took my breath away.

“Do you remember what I said to you when we met?” I said.

She nodded, shyly. She was trembling. She was afraid of whatever I was about to do. My cock pressed against my jeans like a caged tiger wanting to escape.

“I said, I’d destroy you. I said, I’d drink you like the desert drinks the rain. That I’d ravage you until you begged me to stop.”

“I remember.”

“Well, that’s what I’m here to do, Faith.”

A white sheet covered her body and she removed it, revealing everything she had to offer me. My heart pounded with a raw, animal desire.

She smiled, faintly.

“I’m going to put my seed in your womb, and when I’m done, if it’s God’s will, you’ll be carrying my son.”

She opened her legs seductively. I couldn’t believe it. She wanted me. I’d thought I was destroying her, defiling her with my need to leave an heir, but she was welcoming me with open arms.

“I’m yours, Jackson,” she whispered.

I stripped, and when she saw me she gasped. My cock was so rigid it was red with desire. My blood raged through it. It knew what was coming. It was about to perform the act it had been created for.

I walked to the bed and climbed above her. She looked at me with a mixture of love and terror. I touched her pussy with my hand. It was wet. I smiled.

My finger slid inside her and her muscles clenched around it like a fist.

“That’s my girl,” I said.

I kissed her mouth, forcing my tongue into hers. She sucked it.

As we kissed, I slid my girth into her waiting vagina, filling her with my massive organ. She was tight. She gasped. I was bigger than her ex. That much was clear. I pushed myself all the way in.

She let out a whimper, more a cry than a moan.

“You’re going to be mine, Faith. You’re going to be completely mine after this.”

“I know,” she whispered.

“And I’m going to be yours too,” I said.

She pulled me closer to her and my cock throbbed with pleasure. The knowledge that I was about to pour my wet semen into her naked womb thrilled me.

There would be no undoing this. It was the language of God, or else God never spoke.

I pushed my cock all the way inside her and pulled back out. Her fingers gripped the muscles in my shoulders. I pushed inside her again. She moaned. I built up speed, pushing myself into her and pulling back out. In and out, like an engine piston. Something took over, an insane passion.

I knew that when I came, my semen would hit her cervix. No rubber bag would catch my seed this time. I would pour freely into her womb and, together, we would create a new life. I wanted it. I wanted to feel it happen.

I pushed in, my cock throbbing with pleasure. I was forcing myself so deep she cried with each thrust.

An innocent child—that’s what I thought as my cock plowed her mercilessly.

Her legs clenched my waist so tightly she was going to bruise us both. I wanted it. I wanted to be bruised. I wanted to leave my mark on her.

She was mine. She was going to be mine forever.

Any man that threatened that risked his life. I would erase all memory of Wolf Staten from the world. He’d defiled Faith, he’d threatened her, and she was
mine
.

I grabbed her breasts. They were so small and soft in my massive hands. I looked into her eyes.

“I’m coming, Faith.”

“I know,” she cried.

I could feel it. I felt the force of my semen blast into her with such intensity it threatened to shatter her. She cried out. Her muscles clenched me so tightly it hurt. Her cunt gripped my cock like a noose. I shot my load into her like my very life depended on it. Her womb took my semen. I flowed into her. Again and again I climaxed. Each surge of pleasure brought a new spurt of sperm.

Her eyes were locked on mine. I was doing it. I was putting my seed in her belly. I was putting my child in her.

I’d taken her. I’d claimed her. She was mine now, and she’d be mine forever. God Himself could not undo what I’d just done to her.

“I’m yours,” she whispered as my orgasm subsided.

“Yes,” I said. “You’re mine,” and as I said it, my voice cracked.

Tears welled up in my eyes and fell onto her face. For the first time in my adult life, I cried.

Chapter 13

Faith

I
T MAKES NO SENSE,
but that night with Jackson, I felt safer than I’d ever felt before in my life. Everything was different. The entire world was new. I was his now, his property, his woman. I was carrying his child, or at least, I hoped I was. I’d know in a few weeks. And that’s all that mattered.

At no time during the past two years, during all the time I’d spent with Wolf Staten, had I felt that safe or that possessed. Despite all Wolf’s power, all the henchmen he had at his beck and call, he’d never felt as powerful or as possessive as Jackson felt.

I
wanted
to be owned by Jackson. I wanted to be his property. I wanted his semen inside me.

Carrying his child would be the greatest honor of my life.

The only problem was that in the morning he was going to ride out to the Los Lobos compound and find his death.

I clung to him so tightly that night, as if I could somehow stop the storm that was brewing. I knew I couldn’t. I might as well have been trying to stop the weather.

Through the window I could see the white orb of the moon. It was a peaceful place. I loved that house. I would happily have stayed there with Jackson. I’d have been able to forget Wolf. He wouldn’t find us there. It would be like I’d never known him. But Jackson couldn’t live like that. I knew that, and I respected it.

“Faith,” he whispered.

“Yes?”

“Do you feel different?”

I touched my belly. It was soft and smooth and warm. I did feel different, but not in the way he meant. I felt safe. I felt like I belonged to someone, a man, a real man, who knew how to possess me. I didn’t know if I felt pregnant or not. I wanted to, but there was no way of knowing.

“I feel safe,” I said.

“Good. I want you to feel safe. I want you to feel safe for the rest of your life.”

That’s why he had to go after Wolf.

“You know what they say where I come from?” he said.

“No, I don’t even know where you come from.”

“The Socorro Valley,” he said, “vineyards, the ocean, that’s where I call home.”

“It sounds nice,” I said.

“It is nice. You’ll see.”

I smiled. I liked that idea. I wanted to go back to wherever it was he came from. I wanted to have a life with him. If I was to have a child, I wanted its father to be with me.

“So,” I said, “what do they say there?”

Jackson grinned. “They say, a man that doesn’t know how to make a lady come, is no man at all.”

I blushed. He’d given me more orgasms in the past twenty-four hours than Wolf had been able to give me in two years.

“Is that so?” I said.

He nodded, and climbed down beneath the sheets.

“Jackson, what are you doing?”

He didn’t need to answer. His tongue answered for him, licking my clit softly, his stubbled chin tickling my thighs. It gave me goosebumps.

I gasped.

His tongue flicked back and forth, causing me to squirm in pleasure. I grabbed my pillow and hugged it tightly, trying to stifle my body’s response to what he was doing.

His tongue ran from the top of my clit, down over my vagina, and all the way beneath me till he reached my anus. I was shocked. No one had ever licked me there before. I wanted him to stop. I was terrified. That wasn’t something I’d ever expected to happen.

I covered my face with the pillow as he forced his head between my legs, holding them open with his powerful arms.

I was
his
now. There was no way I could stop him from doing what he wanted to me. I was at his mercy, just as he’d told me I’d be.

And I liked it.

His tongue pressed against my anus, sending a shiver of excitement up into my flesh. He held my cheeks open with his large hands and licked everything he wanted to lick.

I was glad to have that pillow. It gave me some cover, somewhere to hide, even if it was just in my mind.

His finger reached up and toyed with my clit. His other hand grabbed one of my breasts and softly pinched the nipple. The finger on my clit slid into my wet pussy and I shuddered with pleasure.

All the while, his tongue toyed with my anus like it was a predator and I was its prey.

I wrapped my legs around his head and clenched as tightly as I could. I had no control over it. My body was responding out of its own sense of self-preservation.

As his finger slid into the wet mouth of my pussy, his tongue pushed into my anus and I cried out, pulling the pillow over my face.

The orgasm shook me like an earthquake. I clutched the pillow like it was an enemy I was trying to rip apart. Pleasure built up until breaking point and then everything inside me collapsed at once. The orgasm came in waves, shuddering pleasure destroying everything inside me but my ability to scream, writhe, and feel ecstatic, sexual pleasure.

“Jackson,” I cried out.

He came up from beneath the sheets and put his wet mouth on my face. I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t believe what he was doing to me. When he said I’d beg him, when he said he’d be my complete master, he meant it. He meant every word.

Chapter 14

Jackson

I
WOKE UP EARLY,
before dawn, and Faith was still asleep. I’d exhausted her.

I rode into town and picked up some fresh coffee, jam, eggs, bread, milk, and butter. I wasn’t sure what she liked but I knew she’d be hungry. By the time she woke, breakfast was ready.

“Where did all this come from?”

“The market.”

“You made this?”

“It’s just a few eggs.”

She was grateful and thanked me. We ate in bed and drank the coffee. Being with her was like a dream. Everything about the past couple of days was like a dream. From the moment she stepped into the bar, fate had taken over my life.