Resistance (9 page)

But as she got to her feet, dizziness swept through her and
she dropped on her butt into the cold, puffy snow. There were bodies
everywhere. They littered the red snow.

Sickness churned in the pit of her belly. Her side hurt like
a bitch and her feet and hands were so cold and red she swore they would have
to be amputated. An unexpected, sharp bite of tears stung her eyes and a dam of
despair threatened to spill from her, but all that disappeared when she
detected movement from one of the fallen men on her left, outside the fray of
the campsite.

Sweet Jesus.
No. She couldn’t handle putting a bullet
through another guy’s head. Not now. The scent of death was too overwhelming.

But she recognized the man’s coat and his light-blond hair.

Damn!
Blade had come for her too?

She swallowed an anguished cry as she swept her gaze to
Cade’s motionless figure and then to Blade’s slightly moving one.

They had both come for her? Saved her from these horrible
men?

And gotten shot for their troubles.

Nausea rolled through her as she finally managed to climb to
her feet. Feet that hurt so bad they were on fire. But the hurt was better than
being numb and useless. She needed to find her boots.

Surveying the disarray in the camp, she wanted to run from the
bloodied bodies crumpled here and there and get far away from this evil. She clamped
down on the urge to flee and focused on locating her boots. They lay near the
smoldering fireplace. Her gut twisted at the sickening scent of burnt flesh as
she spied a man’s arm that had flopped into the fire when he’d fallen after
being shot.

She bit back the sour bile rising in her throat and
struggled into her socks and boots. Inhaling at the fiery pain burning in her
side, she swung her gaze back to the scene strewn with lifeless bodies. She could
no longer hold back her anguish at what had almost happened to her.

She screamed. And screamed.

* * * * *

Reena’s gut-wrenching shrieks rocked Cade right to his core.
He lay in the snow, on his back, his breath shooting like white flares into the
cold air. Through the haze of excruciating pain, he saw Reena sitting on a log,
her eyes squeezed shut tight, her hands stuffed beneath her armpits as she
rocked back and forth, screaming.

He wanted to get up out of the cold snow and wrap his arms
around her. Wanted to reassure her she was safe. Unfortunately every time he so
much as moved a muscle, powerful jolts of pain rocked into his right shoulder
and chest, making him inhale sharply, which in turn made his head spin.

Warm blood flowed out of him, lacing his flesh, sticky and
wet, and his body chilled as he readied himself to meet his maker.

Fuck, he was in bad shape. He opted to just lie there and
listen to Reena’s screams, knowing instinctively she was releasing her fear. Physically
she seemed to be out of harm’s way and it appeared the men were dead. At least
he hoped they were after seeing them drop one by one, compliments of Blade and
their surprise attack on the camp.

Icy snowflakes caressed his hot face. Yep, no use in moving,
he’d only pass out. For all he knew, he was already dead. Blade was probably
dead, too. Cade had seen him go down. At least with Blade out of the way she’d
have a fighting chance to reach safety.

He wrapped himself in the comforting knowledge of meeting up
with those bastards who’d just hurt her. In heaven or hell, wherever God saw
fit to put them, he’d make sure every one of them—whoever had hurt Reena—would
pay.

* * * * *

Blade drifted in swirls of searing pain. His left chest area
hurt. Every time he inhaled, fire lanced through him. So he tried not to
inhale. Tried not to breathe. But no breathing meant death. If he died, he’d
never have another night like the one he’d had with Reena all those months ago,
and he really would enjoy fucking her again.

Oh man, just thinking of her brought a lash of confused
emotions. Up until last night, he’d been able to keep a tight lid on his
attraction toward her and concentrate on following through on his kill orders.
But seeing her wrists cuffed, her ankles restrained, the need for protection
shining in her vulnerable eyes—he’d caved like a sixteen-year-old school boy raging
withhormones.

Yeah, he’d like to have her again, but that would mean he’d
have to get up. Breathe. Endure more pain.

Suddenly, he became aware of noise. It grew louder and
louder until it mixed with his red-hot pain. An engine? But that couldn’t be.
They were in the middle of nowhere. No roads. Just trees and snow. He tried to
open his eyes. Couldn’t.

He was cold. Icy waves speared right down into his bones
like a poison, anesthetizing his mind and chilling his brain. Numbing his
senses and crippling his well-honed reflexes. To his surprise, the ground moved
beneath him. No, not possible. The ground couldn’t move like this. Or maybe he
was
moving?

His temples throbbed with an excruciating headache. The roar
of the engine broke into his mind again, followed by the strong scent of gas.
The motion continued and so did the racket.

He drifted off and slept. For how long, he had no idea. A
sound…maybe a door closing? Whatever it was woke him. He tried to open his
eyelids again. It was hard. But he managed and winced at the blinding glare of
the setting sun. No, not the sun. A light? Yes, a porch light. It glowed,
stabbing like daggers into his head, thrusting his vision into a world of pain.

He closed his eyes again, welcomed the relief. Waited a few
seconds and then opened his eyes, this time squinting and wishing he had a pair
of sunglasses.

Behind the painful glare, he made out a building. A big one.
A log cabin. One story. A roof covered in snow and lots of snow-drenched pine
trees towering behind the building.

He recognized it. Had come across it while tracking Red. This
was where she’d been living. He’d gone into the cabin after finding the door
wide open. Someone had busted in and vandalized the place.

Despite the mess, he’d found the place rustic. Bookshelves
had lined the living room. An old cast-iron potbelly stove was warm to the
touch and coals glowed in a nearby fireplace. She’d left an erotic romance novel
lying on the couch. A quick glance at the back cover blurb revealed the book
contained lots of hot sex and a threesome. He could just imagine what the men
who’d broken into the cabin thought about what she’d been reading.

He’d left the building in a hurry, following the tracks
until he’d come upon the group of men who’d set up camp. In the nearby bushes,
he’d listened to their conversations about tracking down the woman who was
staying at that cabin. Blade would have opened fire on them, but there had been
too many for him to shoot. He wouldn’t have been able to get away without being
trailed by survivors. The last thing he’d wanted was for them to know he was
around. So he’d left and gone in search of Red himself. He’d found her and Cade
and then the storm had hit.

Blade focused back on the present, to the square logs with
cement caulking. Homemade job. With matching stone chimneys on each end. His
gaze lifted toward the sky where a spiral of gray smoke puffed into the black
night air. Chimneys meant fireplaces and that meant heat. Warmth cracked
through the chill encasing his heart and, for a split second, he had the weird sense
of “coming home”.

He ripped himself free from that odd homey comfort when
someone stepped down the rough-hewn wood-planked stairs. He wondered if the
person was a hallucination, but the shadow seemed solid as it moved toward him.
Red’s face floated from beneath a black hat and scarf, and just like every time
he saw her, his breath seemed to halt in his lungs.

She was a striking woman. Beautiful. A ripe, sensual mouth.
Gorgeous eyes. A man could drown in her eyes. Her hair was loose and spilled from
her black hat like wildfire to the tops of her shoulders. He didn’t know how he
could see her hair in all that dark shit she wore, but he could.

His gaze flew back to her face. Bruises and cuts lashed her
high cheekbones where she’d been slapped. The cold deepened inside him and at
that moment he wanted to once again kill those bastards who’d hurt her.

She squatted beside him and white puffs of mist escaped her
mouth with her every breath. Her lips moved. She was talking. He must have
blacked out because he’d missed what she said. Her lips moved again.

“Will? Can you hear me?”

Hell, he didn’t remember giving her his first name. Warmth
shot through him. Although he’d known it was the drugs urging her into his room
that night, and he’d sworn he’d turn her down flat if she approached him, the
instant she’d exposed herself to him—along with the tugging on all those rings—his
self-control had vanished. He’d taken her up against the door and she’d been
like a drug in his system, making him crave her again.

The erotic scent of her pleasure, her heat, her arousal,
swept in around him and for a moment he was back in that room, kissing her
pouty warm lips and licking her engorged clit while he held her ass cheeks. Her
moans had been sweet and succulent.

“Will? Will? Can you hear me?” Her insistent voice snapped
through his memory.

“I need you to wake up, Blade. Or you’re going to end up
freezing your ass off out here on my grandparents’ snowmobile. So come on! Do
me a favor and wake up!”

Snowmobile?

A sharp pain snapped against his frozen right cheek and
damned if the reflexes he thought dead didn’t come to life. With lightning
speed, he grabbed her by the wrist and held tight. Her surprised gasp made his
cock tighten in awareness.

Well, what do you know? He wasn’t in such bad shape, after
all.

“You’d better make sure I can’t catch you the next time you
do that,” he croaked. Her cheeks darkened more than they already had from the
cold.

Shit. She was blushing. Maybe she wasn’t as damaged as he’d
originally thought.

He drifted again. Drifted into the memories. Of warmth. Of
Red. Kissing her. Her hot, eager lips melting over his. Her mouth swollen and
moist, opening to him, his tongue invading her sweet cavern.

Oh man, he could just about drown in these memories. She
tasted so succulent…

* * * * *

He held her wrist so tight she couldn’t escape even if she’d
wanted to. And she really didn’t want to because the sexual darkness in his
eyes, his exquisite warning about her slapping him—as well as her need to wake
him any way she could—had her lowering her head until their lips met.

Scorching tingles shot through her mouth and mind as her
lips melted over his. She’d expected the kiss to be as weak as he appeared. It
wasn’t. It was potent. Powerful and needy.

Just as needy as the sexual desire pounding through her. The
heat of his kiss pushed aside everything else. Suddenly it was just the two of
them. Just as it had been the one other time in that bedroom.

She fought to breathe as a rush of want raced through her.
Lust, hot and heavy. Thick and powerful. It swept through her entire being like
a firestorm, lashing her senses and sparking in her brain.

She wanted Blade. Wanted him like in her fantasy last night.
Like she’d had him at the safe house. The kiss deepened and she inhaled him
deep inside her lungs.

He was male. Raw and primal. Dominating. His scent powered
through her and sailed deep into her bloodstream. Her body tightened with
arousal, her pussy clenched. Hot moisture splayed against her panties. The
driving hunger for him to fuck her took hold.

His tongue mated with hers. Erotic tingles swept through her
and, with the growing heat, she unzipped her coat and cupped her breast.

Jolting at the realization she was getting carried away, Reena
moaned with regret and broke the kiss. Blade groaned. His eyes were open and he
seemed lucid.

“Need to get inside,” he panted. She wondered if he meant
inside the cabin or inside of her. In the lamplight, his dark eyes glittered
with pain and he inhaled sharply as she helped him off the snowmobile.
Standing, he swayed like a drunkard but thankfully didn’t fall over.

Her legs went weak with relief as he stumbled forward. With
her help, he managed the stairs, lurched across the planked porch and yanked
open the screen door.

Within minutes, she had him sitting on a cot set up beside
the woodstove. Heat blasted him in waves and Blade wished to hell his limbs
would continue to co-operate, but it was as if his body knew it would be better
if Red undressed him.

And she did. He was weak as a kitten and barely able to
enjoy the show as she unzipped his jacket. Pain burst through his chest and he
gasped as she tried to maneuver his jacket off his shoulders.

“Sorry,” she soothed.

When she had his shirt off, concern flushed her face.
Concern for him. He spied the blood streaking his upper body and the puckered
hole in his shoulder. With every breath, the pain slicing through him grew more
intense.

He wondered about Cade. Had he fared any better? He had been
shot and went down about the same time Blade had been hit himself.

Was Cade dead? A spear of bitter disappointment grabbed him.
Cade’s five brothers would hurt with the loss, and Blade might have made a good
solid friend in the guy if they both hadn’t been after Red.

Through the pounding pain knocking through his brain, he
wanted to ask her about Cade, but a motionless figure lay on another cot
directly on the other side of the potbelly woodstove. Relief whispered through
him.

Outlaw was pale. Like death warmed over.

“Cade?” he muttered.

“He took a couple of bullets. One in his right shoulder, the
other in his upper chest. You’ve got a head wound besides this one.” She nodded
to his blood-soaked upper torso. “Cade is alive. For now.”