Lover Mine (Blood Brothers 1) (5 page)

"Look who's talking!"
Shutting down
the link was impossible so he didn't even try. From the moment he
had seen Chayle hanging from that ceiling, felt her mental anguish
reaching out to him across the forest even while unconscious, their
fates were forever linked. Somehow destiny had sent his team to
that remote location to get her and now he didn't know if he would
be able to let her go.

"Stop ignoring me, moron!" The object of his
thoughts took that exact moment in time to decide to try to
jackknife her shapely legs in his grasp, her hipbone scraping
against his painful erection. "Either talk to me or put me down
this instant."

Chayle hadn't been this mad since some
dumbass had rear ended her new car and almost totaled it, and of
course he hadn't had any insurance. Now she was being carted around
like a sack of potatoes by a giant who refused to tell her where
they were going and kept giving her killer looks every time she
asked him logical questions. A girl could just scream.

She watched Davey slip silently out the
stairwell door and Kayne shifted her in his arms. Then the door
quietly opened again and they were quickly rushing out, climbing
into a black SUV parked just outside the door. Chayle wasn't given
time to look around or see where they were, much less allow anyone
to see her being shuttled into the vehicle. As soon as the doors
closed behind them, the huge truck was speeding out of the
underground garage and into traffic.

"Are you finally going to tell me where
we're going, or do I get to wait and be surprised?" she lambasted
him yet again. She huffed as he settled her in his lap instead of
on the leather seat next to him, and Chayle was reminded of the
impressive length of male hardness she had felt earlier under his
leather pants. She wiggled her butt to get comfortable, or so she
tried to tell herself, and heard his quick indrawn breath as her
firm rear rubbed against him.

"If you don't keep still you may find
yourself with more than you can handle, woman!" Kayne whispered
near the soft shell of her ear. He kept his words soft for her ears
only, but he knew his brother's excellent hearing would still pick
up the threat. A warm lick of her earlobe was unavoidable as he
watched her cheeks flush with his warning and his lips curved just
a bit.

"You don't scare me." Chayle refused to look
at him, choosing to watch the buildings flash by at an alarming
rate as she wondered where they were taking her and why. The
brothers had told her the threat was gone, they had promised.
Didn't they say the ones who had taken her were dead? Or was there
something else?

"If you got the kidnappers why are we
leaving the hospital like this?" she finally managed to ask, her
breathing escalating with her raging thoughts.

"I told you it wouldn't work"
Rafe
growled silent to his thickheaded brother.

Over his shoulder and more pointed to
Chayle, Rafe said, "It's a precaution, Chayle. You don't have to
worry about the creeps who took you, promise!"

He risked a quick look behind him again,
catching the panicked look in her dark eyes. "However, we do know
the group had connections with others, an extensive network that
wasn't at the cabin. We can't take a chance with your safety and
you haven't healed enough to trust others to protect you."

His matter-of-fact explanation sounded so
plausible, so believable that for a few heartbeats it didn't even
cross her mind to argue with him. Until she moved in the giant's
arms that held her, until she felt the raging hard-on that pressed
against the bruises that still covered the tender cheeks of her ass
and rock hard thighs that pressed like a furnace against hers. Her
stomach flip-flopped and her mind raced as she felt the panic race
over her again, reaching like a demon with icy fingers around her
chest to squeeze the air from her lungs.

Her vision blurred, her breathing caught as
she fought to drag air into her tortured lungs. She didn't see the
buildings as they blurred past the SUV in the night or the bright
lights that could possibly tell her where she was.

The smell of sweat and blood, curses and
pain filled her vision. A deep cold descended upon her, tremors
shaking her body from the inside out to the point that her teeth
began to chatter. All she could hear was her own heartbeat, her
mantra inside her head telling herself to survive just a little
longer, they can't touch the core that was her soul.

Clinching her eyes shut, her body felt those
fingers brutally pinching rosy nipples again, felt tender bare skin
slapped and cut that had only felt a lover's touch a few times in
the past. A whimper escaped through lips pressed tightly together
to hold back a scream. Chayle hadn't realize she had clinched her
eyes shut or wrapped her arms around herself until Kayne began
shaking her.

"Stop it!" he growled directly into her
face. "Open your eyes and look at me, damn it!"

Chayle's lids flew open the instant she
heard his growl, blazing blue eyes drilling into her, pulling her
into their unusual blue depths. Trembling fingers reached up to
touch a chiseled cheek covered in a day's growth of stubble to
ensure he was real before huge silent tears leaked from the corners
of her dark eyes.

"I can't close my eyes, Kayne," she
whispered. "Every time I do I smell them, feel them." And then the
shudders started, bone deep, starting all the way from her soul and
taking her breath away.

"Ah baby," he breathed.

It was all he could say as he wrapped her in
his strength and met Rafe's gaze in the rear view mirror. "No one
will find you. I promised, didn't I?"

"But you can't take the memories away. I
have to live with those," Chayle whispered softly as she lay her
head against his shoulder. He felt her quiet sobs as she cried and
it broke his heart, the one Kayne was convinced he no longer felt.
"How will I ever sleep with the nightmares now?"

He couldn't take her sobs, they were killing
him. She never felt the small prick as he injected her with a
sedative that quickly took effect. One minute she was quietly
clutching his shirt in a death grip and sobbing, the next she lay
limp and silent in his arms.

"Fuck!" his curse was loud and hard, filling
the SUV with vicious anger as he stared down at the woman in his
arms.

"My thoughts exactly!" was the only comment
Rafe contributed as his brother continued to hold her.

Some distance away, another was livid!

"What do you mean they escaped?" The one who
called himself 'The Master' stood before the large bank of windows
looking out over a meticulously groomed lawn that stretched for
acres. The estate afforded him the facilities necessary to
camouflage his various ventures under the guise of a working
gentleman's ranch. At the moment he could see several quarter
horses being trained in a paddock, but his eyes didn't see the
beauty of their gait.

"We lost them at the hospital," the young
man stuttered, eyes on the floor. "Our informant gave us a heads up
that something was happening so men were sent in to acquire the
test subject but they were already on the move. By the time we were
able to locate them, she was gone."

The Master was quiet, never allowing his
control to bubble above the surface that threatened to turn the
light into blackness. Failure was not an option. Those who failed
him paid the consequences.

"Who was on this assignment?" he asked,
never revealing his intentions.

"Davis, sir."

"Have him recalled and placed in the
training facility by 1600 tonight. I will personally see to his
discipline!" The barely controlled violence almost bubbled up, but
he continued to controlled it. Until he turned to look at the young
man waiting for further orders.

Eyes as black as sin stared at the young
man, chilling his soul. Davis would never walk out of the training
facility this night. The young man would bet his soul on it.

The room was quiet and dark as he sat
slumped in the overstuffed chair in the corner, feet propped up on
the end of the bed, watching her sleep. Chayle had not moved once
since he had placed her in his large King-size bed, gently tucking
the soft sheets and quilt around her slender body to keep her
warm.

He and Rafe kept the house cool because it
suited them due to their unique metabolisms and it had never
occurred to him how it could affect someone else. Now he had Chayle
to worry about, and she was still healing, barely out of the
hospital a day.

The humidity of east Texas could be stifling
at times to those not use to it and especially since Chayle had
live the last few years in Colorado. He loved the green hill
country around his home but he wondered how she would compare it to
the mountains. Kayne could not wait to show her the compound but it
could wait.

A soft moan and quick eye movements reminded
Kayne why he stood silent guard, unable and unwilling to risk her
waking up in a strange place yet again, alone. Too many changes in
too short of time, still she retained such spunk and temper that it
drew him like a dark flame.

She had even dared to slap at him, causing a
rare grin to lift full lips in the darkness of the room as he
remembered her temper. No one had ever slapped him.

Just the thought of it had him growing hard
and restless all over again. No other female had ever stood up to
him like that and Kayne could only be further amazed as to why he
allowed her to continue to do so. It could endanger Chayle's safety
if she thought she could sway him, much less that he might actually
allow her to think it could work.

"NO!" The scream was high and shrill as
Chayle came off the bed in a rush, her eyes wild and blind, mouth
open for another shriek. Kayne was there before she could utter
another sound, he mouth covering hers in a soft, soothing kiss.

"Easy," he crooned. "No one is here but us,
rest easy." Kayne held both hands in one of his large ones, the
other gently smoothing back the mop of chestnut curls cascading
around Chayle's forehead and shoulders. The mass of dark silk
filled his hand as he tried to soothe, slowly pulling her from the
realm of sleep where the monsters chased and demons lurked. She
shook so hard it was a wonder the entire bed did not tremble under
them. Finally he pulled her onto his lap and gently rocked her
against his chest, feeling the silent sobs shake her chest as she
tried to hold them back. He felt them all the way to his soul.

"There is no one here but the two of us," he
whispered.

"They were there," she wheezed painfully
between clenched teeth. "I couldn't stop them, couldn't make them
stop hurting the other girl!" Her body shook, the sobs soft and yet
crippling as he cuddled her close, letting the terror loose rather
than remain hidden in the shadows of her mind where it could fester
and grow.

"What other girl?" he whispered, already
knowing the answer.

"There was another girl at the compound
where you found me. She was so much younger, so tiny. I could not
let them hurt her. I couldn't," she sobbed. "I tried to keep their
attention on me."

Chayle's hiccups tore at his resolve as he
rubbed her back with rough hands that were used to weapons and
hand-to-hand combat rather than easing a woman's fears. He did not
realize how he clenched her closer, listening quietly as she voiced
her terror. "They finally took her away once they started torturing
me."

"Chayle, are saying you
deliberately
made yourself a target to protect the other girl?" Kayne tried to
keep the anger out of his voice, but he knew it bled through. She
had purposely made them angry to save the other girl. This small
woman had fought the only way she could at the time, allowing men
to hurt her more than they probably would have in order to buy time
and protect the younger girl held captive. Not only was she brave
but stupid. With no way of protecting herself from whatever torture
those monsters were planning, Chayle had endured horrendous acts,
more so than any he had seen in many years and it sickened him.

"I didn't know what else to do, Kayne!" she
whispered, finally looking at him with swollen and drenched eyes.
"She was so tiny, so young." A sob escaped at her words, and it
tore at his hardened soul.

She held onto him as if he was her only
lifeline, her fists balled tight into his T-shirt as he gently
rocked her. "Do you remember much more after that?"

He hated asking her to remember but knew she
needed to talk about it. However, if they had missed anything now
was the time to find out. It tore his soul open when she finally
looked up at him.

Tawny and chocolate colored eyes looked up
into his, the dimness of the room doing nothing to conceal the
strength or internal metal of this amazing female he held in his
arms, stealing his breath. "I remember everything they did to me!"
she growled through her tears.

"Then you should know that my brother and I
are here to ensure no one will ever cause you pain again."

He was so confident, unconsciously stroking
her back that Chayle knew this giant truly believed his promise.
However, how could she trust him when she did not know him or that
other hulking brute that claimed to be his twin? The one thing her
military father had taught her was always listen to your instincts!
Panic, hot and fast, hit Chayle as she finally realized the
magnitude of her situation.

Then something deep and primal, and
instinctual force rose within Chayle suddenly from somewhere deep
inside and she knew -
KNEW
without a doubt that she could
trust this man.

It did not matter that she had only known
him since waking up in the hospital less than a week ago, or that
there was some strange, intangible force she could feel pulling
them together. Her gut told her to trust him; her instincts told
her this was important.