Dream Shadow (13 page)

The night air caressed her exposed body as she felt the hard tip of his sex probing her entrance. She wrapped her arms around his massive shoulders. The animal inside him wanted to claim her. It was a primitive ritual where logic had no place.

The hard thrust of his body split her flesh. Grace clenched her teeth against the pain. Brice flung his head back as he fought for control. His chest rose on huge breaths as he let them escape through clenched teeth.

“You’re a virgin.” He cursed under his breath.

“Does it matter?” Her voice was soft with hurt. Brice bit back his next curse.

“I would have waited…’til I got you back to a real bed.”

“Don’t stop.” She couldn’t bear that. The pain was gone and all she felt was the raging need that had drawn them together. She tightened her legs around his hips. His staff jumped inside her, making her quiver with renewed need.

“I won’t.” He moved his hips with fluid thrusts that stroked the center of her body. Waves of pleasure washed through her. There was so much pleasure. It began to build into rapture.

“Yes.” A tiny moan escaped Grace and she tilted her hips forward to allow deeper penetration. He drove his length into her body at a pace that stole her breath. She clung to him as he controlled the tempo. Tension coiled in her belly as he moved in and out of her. He stretched her almost to the point of pain. She hung on the border as he sent his staff in to the hilt.

“That’s it, honey. Hold me.” Her passage gripped him with internal muscles as he thrust harder and deeper.

Brice watched her face. “Come for me, Grace.” She lifted her emerald eyes and their gazes locked. “Just let it happen.”

She didn’t have any choice. His body was too controlling. His thrusts centered on her clit, making it tighten and pulse with each thrust. All of the sensation twisted into an unbearable knot one second before she exploded. Her thighs clamped around his hips as she clung to him as the waves hit her deepest core. It was rapture, pure and simple.

He growled deep inside his chest and thrust up into her body with a force that shook her. The orgasm caused her muscles to clench around him. He thrust again and exploded. His cock spurted its load deep inside her, sending another, deeper wave of delight through her. Spent, she collapsed against Brice, somehow knowing that he wouldn’t let her fall. It was at that moment she surrendered herself completely.

The second her feet touched the ground her skirt dropped over her legs to cover her impulsive behavior. Her mind jumped into sharp focus as her body continued to pulse.

He raised her head and firmly kissed her. It was a warm, deep kiss that moved over her mouth in a lazy movement.

“Let’s go find a bed.” Brice left her standing there as he brought Cole forward. He didn’t mount the horse. Instead, he settled his hands onto her hips and lifted her up onto the back of the animal. Brice swung up behind her and pulled her against his body with a solid arm.

Each step the horse took on the way back to camp seemed to jar Grace back into reality. Such a complete loss of control defied her understanding. Her body never controlled her mind. She couldn’t let it happen.

The arm that bound her to Brice was solid yet tender. His hand stroked her thigh with deep movements. He pulled her against a chest that was so very inviting with its strength. He laid tiny kisses along her hairline as he guided them closer and closer to the hard evidence of reality.

Somehow, she’d been able to let herself be free in the forest. Here in camp, there were eyes ready to critique her every movement. Grace pulled herself into tight control. It was her only defense against a life that was often brutally harsh.

The sight of her tent made her face erupt into flames. Grace dropped from the horse and simply ran from Brice. He shattered her control. But she couldn’t survive without discipline.

It was cowardly, but she doubted her ability to explain herself to him. The reason was simple.

She didn’t understand her feelings at all.

Her skirt flipped out in ripples as she ran. Brice frowned. He wanted to follow her and force her to face him—and he would. He hadn’t counted on her being a virgin. If he’d known, he would have managed to find the strength to wait to make love to her until they got to a bed. At least this first time.

But he wasn’t sorry. Truth was, he was deeply satisfied that she belonged only to him. If that meant he had to chase her to the end of the globe, he would.

Dismounting, Brice spotted one of the Rangers. The man moved quickly away from Grace’s tent and toward better cover now that their operative was back in sight. Brice nodded approval. She wasn’t in his tent, but she was safe. For the moment, it had to be enough. Grace would come to him. Nothing short of that would appease him.

And she’d do it right in front of her unit.

The bright rays of morning crept over the surface of the canvas tent, lighting up the interior. Sleep had been little more than a distant image, but too many years of military training refused to allow her brain to slip back into slumber now that day was breaking.

She rolled over, sat and rubbed her burning eyes for a moment. Where had that discipline been last night when she needed it? It took more than an hour to master the urge to return outside. She’d sat on her cot while her traitorous body had urged her, no…demanded that she return for more of what Brice had shown her he could and would give her.

Renewed anger shot through her. Scared? Why was she scared? She had sat on this damn cot and demanded that very question of herself last night. Nothing scared her anymore. Once, having people shoot at her had scared her, but not anymore. How could it? She’d have to care about the future to be frightened.

She was nothing but a tool to be utilized at someone else’s command. The intolerable part of that was that she found herself believing it lately. Had she really let them wash her personality so clean that she refused to even feel? That was so pathetic she winced.

Had she really given up? She was still alive, wasn’t that worth more of an effort than refusing to let the smallest emotion into her mind?

Brice certainly made her feel last night. The question wasn’t merely sex or no sex—it was about trust, and yielding her mind to the control of her emotions. But she had enjoyed it so much she wanted more.

He was the man she couldn’t have.

The edges of reality were ultra-sharp in the morning light.

A slight movement caught her notice. Grace turned her head. Jacobs was stretched out on a cot on the other side of the tent. His expression was disgruntled as his hazel eyes fired questions at her. Grace closed her eyes and groaned. Jacobs slept lighter than a mother bear. He was completely aware of her restless night. In fact, he’d shared it. Now he’d probably want to know the reason behind it.

Grace would simply walk away from and not give another thought to ninety-five percent of the people on this planet, but not Jacobs. He was also one of the very few people who knew her, really knew her.

Grace got to her feet and started to get back into the petticoats and corset. She purposely kept her eyes away from Jacobs. She had to get her emotions straight before trying to deal with him.

“The silent game isn’t going to work this morning, Grace.”

Grace forced her face to appear mild before turning back to where he was still stretched out on his cot. He slowly sat, pegging her with a hard look.

“Anton lost you when you took off on that stallion.”

“You’re the one who brought me up here, Jacobs. Don’t get pissy when I take advantage of the moment.”

The deep sound of Brice’s voice as he greeted Cole broke into their mental battle. The sound of that deep voice brought her unsteady emotions closer to the surface. Jacobs’s eyes locked onto the proof of it on her face. Between the two men Grace felt suffocation tighten around her. She needed to breathe. Turning on her heel, she started for the freedom that the tent opening promised. Jacobs captured her wrist, pulling her to a stop.

“Let go.”

“First you talk to me about what has been eating you for the last few months.”

“My feelings are the only things that are private. I performed, that’s all that matters.”

“Not when you disregard your own safety.”

She set her jaw, refusing to argue further.

“All right, then we do this my way.” Jacobs snapped a small silver bracelet onto her wrist before he released her.

Grace glared at him for a moment. She felt like arguing but the need to escape from all human contact was greater. Turning her back on Jacobs, she swiftly left the tent. Brice looked up as she emerged but she barely spared him a glance. That one look was enough to set her emotions to the breaking point and she yanked her skirt away from her feet as she climbed up to the tree line and the safety it presented.

She didn’t stop but continued at her frantic pace until her sides began to ache from the constriction of her corset. The pause was enough to make her aware of the distance she had traveled. She was maybe a mile and a half from the tent. Lifting her right arm, Grace glared at the bracelet. It was a tracking device, an electronic leash. She despised the thing. It would give off an alarm if she were separated from Jacobs by more than two miles. It could then be used to pinpoint her exact location.

Her paging unit functioned in a similar fashion. The difference was she carried it by choice. Trying to remove the bracelet would set off another alarm. The problem with that was the very real possibility that Jacobs would replace it with a close-proximity unit that he carried for combat situations. That device only had a fifty-foot range.

Sinking to the forest floor, Grace pulled her knees up to her chest. The light breeze stirred the morning air. The small sounds of the forest surrounded her. Normally they brought comfort. Today, nothing seemed to be able to quiet the surging emotions that drove her.

She’d surrendered to her lust but still felt conflicted.

Idly turning the shiny thing around her wrist, Grace tried to conceive a course of action. There was a dull ache between her legs to remind her of Brice. Mentally, she couldn’t shake his pull. Maybe it was time to ask Jacobs to take her back to base.

Army bases had a nasty habit of being enclosed in solid concrete. If she asked to be returned there it was, in effect, like locking herself in a stone room. She considered it for a time. It would be much easier to deal with. Raising her eyes to the trees above her, Grace took in the absolute beauty of it. There were few places in the world that she loved as much as the forest. For once she was able to stay and enjoy it.

The blanket crossed her mind but it didn’t tantalize her. Not when she recalled how much anger was lingering at the cabin, which left her facing the fact that her time in Benton would be over soon.

Maybe she was being a fool to waste it.

Grace got to her feet and began to walk back along the way she had come. Turvel had surprised her. Normally he liked to keep her under tight wraps. Grace truly didn’t know the man that well. He had been a friend of Fredricks however, and Grace remembered that very well.

When Fredricks had run the unit, she had worn an ankle close-proximity beacon around the clock. Grace had in fact destroyed several in her attempts to be rid of them. In a way, that was one of the reasons that she and Jacobs were so in tune with one another. She had been tagged with the beacon and someone had to be within fifty feet of her at all times. Grace walked almost constantly. Fredricks allowed it because it kept her physical condition high. However, it meant that someone had to keep pace with her. Guard duty had not been a popular assignment among the men of the unit. Jacobs had taken the duty the majority of the time.

Fredricks himself only took the duty when they had been working. A small smile crept across her face. It had been one of her favorite games to try and get just enough ahead of Fredricks while she was tracking to make the alarm go off in his ear microphone.

The muffled sound of gunfire echoed among the trees. The first battle of the day was in progress. Grace circled the valley to observe. She watched as the columns of re-enactors loaded and primed their weapons. Units of men were working the cannons. She picked out Jacobs as he joined in the effort of loading one of the large black cannons. They fired it and the force of the discharge sent the cannon rolling back some ten feet. The men pushed it forward and resumed loading again.

She felt so disconnected from it all.

Down there were hundreds of people who could sit together and enjoy each other’s company. They touched and loved with open affection. They even became distressed when that contact was removed. Sometimes, she wondered if she was really a member of the same species.

She continued to watch Jacobs interact with them. It was easy to forget that he was in fact very different from her. They spent so much time together it was comfortable to believe they were siblings.

She was deluding herself.

A cavalry charge was next, and the fifty or so horses came up the valley at full gallop. Brice stood out as he rode Cole with a fluid movement that was breathtaking.

It had been even better to experience it.