Staking His Claim (7 page)

"I'm not a virgin." His voice was deep, and
for the first time that night, held a slight trace of humor.

Elaina' mouth tipped in a tiny smile. "I
figured. No, I mean, I'm guessing you're telling me to have fun
with my friends, grow up some, and stay a virgin for you. Do I have
that right?"

"Yeah."

"What about you? Are you going to remain
abstinent for me?"

"Celibate?"

"Yeah. Does it go both ways?"

Raul studied her, wanting to hold her by the
hips and sink into her so badly he thought the waiting would kill
him. He thought about having another woman and quickly dismissed it
from his mind. He didn't want one. He wanted her.
Only
her
.

He answered her swiftly. "Goes both
ways."

Elaina was stunned at his agreement and
didn't even think to question his sincerity. He was sincere. She
would bet on it. "Are you serious?"

"Yeah," he bit out.

"But--"

"I'm not promising I won't jack off, baby.
Just sayin' if you promise to save your cherry for me, I'll stay
clean for you."

Elaina's legs felt jittery as he spelled out
his intentions in basic male language.

"We in agreement?" He pushed for her
answer.

"Yeah, okay. But just so we're clear. I get a
job and continue with my life. I have my friends and you have your
friends and we're both social, just no sex. Right?"

He misunderstood what she said. "You getting
a job when you go back to San Antonio?"

"I'm not going back."

That was news to him. "What? Why?"

"That was my mother's dream for me, being a
nurse. I don't want that. I'm staying here, getting a job, while I
think about my life. About what I want."

Raul was shocked to feel a combination of
stunned pleasure that she wasn't leaving, along with a dark,
tormented knowledge that he'd have to keep fighting himself to stay
away from her.

He was silent as he tried to digest her
change of plans.

She went back to the subject at hand. "So, is
that right? About us, I mean."

He knew she was talking about their agreement
to stay celibate. "That'll be what it takes to calm me down,
yeah."

"And you'll believe me?"

"I have no reason to doubt your word."

An arrow of guilt slid through her.
"Okay."

"Yeah, okay?"

She tried to smile. "Okay."

She started to relax against the barn wall,
but in a swift move, he swung around until his back was against the
wall, his legs were spread wide, and she stood between them, her
pelvis pulled into his body by a strong arm behind her back.

One hand went to her forehead and pushed a
stray curl from her face. "Happy birthday, baby."

She smiled at him, trying to overcome the
guilt that slid through her from her deception. "Thanks," she said,
knowing she needed to tell him. It had gone too far. Now it felt
like a lie. She opened her mouth to try to form the words, but he
began speaking first and the sadness in his voice made her
momentarily forget what she needed to tell him.

"I had a shit day. You feel good."

She relaxed her body against him, soft
tendrils of arousal hitting her system. The juncture of her thighs
pulsed against his blue jeans, making her panties wet and her body
tremble. She tried to concentrate on his words. "What
happened?"

"Lost a mare and her foal. It was a breech
birth and lost them both. It sucked shit."

"I'm sorry." She experimented by tenderly
putting her hand on his cheek.

He grabbed her hand and moved it to his
mouth, kissing her palm. She hung against him while he breathed in
her scent and kissed her palm repeatedly.

He opened his eyes and looked deep into hers.
"And then I come to find you and he's touching you." His voice
hardened.

"Raul," she chided softly.

He took her hand and wrapped it around his
neck and leaned his forehead against hers. He slid his mouth to her
cheek and caressed her with his open lips. Dragging kisses over her
face, he demanded reassurance in a steely voice. "You promised,
right?"

"Yes."

He kissed her mouth softly and continued to
run his lips over her face, his hands moving on her back, sliding
from her waist to her hips, his fingers clenching in her butt, and
then moving to retrace his actions all over again.

He moved his lips to her ear and whispered,
"Someday, someday soon, I'm gonna strip you naked, lay you down on
my bed, and kiss your naked body.
Jesus
, baby, you're
perfect."

His mouth moved to hers, his hands lifted to
her head and angled it slightly, and then sealed his lips over
hers. He held her face, pushed his tongue between her lips and
began kissing her with devastating force. His tongue swirled around
hers, came out, licked over her bottom lip, his teeth grazing her
softly. He groaned deep in his diaphragm, and went back for
more.

She sagged in his embrace, leaning against
him, her brain separated from her body as he kissed her over and
over again. She didn't know where she stopped and he began as she
moved her hands over him, sliding under the tails of his shirt,
running her hands up and over his naked back.

They kissed for a long, long time, his five
o'clock shadow abrading her skin. She felt it, knew it should hurt,
but it didn't. She ran her hands around to his chest and up his
pectoral muscles until her hands covered his small, male
nipples.

He ripped his mouth from hers and pulled her
hands away from his chest and held them tightly while he dragged
oxygen into his lungs.

"Can't do that, babe. You keep that up, I'll
come in my pants."

Shocked, Elaina sucked in a breath and went
back for his mouth. He allowed her access, and lowered his lips
back to hers.

It began again. Their tongues dueled, their
arms entwined. She moaned softly into his mouth, and he gripped her
butt tighter, lifting her into him. She pressed against him, and
started undulating against him.

He ran his hand up the curve of her waist and
landed on a tight little nipple. He rubbed it over her dress and
when he did, she gasped into his mouth and their kiss became
wilder, wetter. He shoved her dress down and took her small, pale,
naked breast into his hand. He squeezed her nipple between his
fingers, pulling at her, twisting her flesh until she was panted
and pushing against him almost violently.

She broke her mouth free for oxygen and he
spoke. "Come for me, babe. Give it to me."

He pushed his mouth back on hers and drank
deeply from her while his fist clenched her butt rhythmically and
his fingers caressed her breast.

Elaina's mind was numb and sheer pleasure
took over her body. She pushed against him, needing it, needing
him.

His hand left her butt and came around and
pushed her dress up and out of his way. Sinking one long finger
into the top of her panties, he landed on her glistening clit and
began rubbing, swirling his finger over it.

In seconds, she was mewling in his mouth and
coming hard in his arms.

He held her tight, as pleasure beyond any
pleasure she had ever known hit her body full force. She splintered
completely as the orgasm ran through her.

Her mouth fell from his and her head fell to
his neck where she took huge, gasping breaths of air while she
slowly came down.

His hands slowly fell from her sweet spots
and his arms enclosed her completely. He held her tightly as his
large body shook, trying to regain control.

His breathing finally slowed, and he rasped
against her ear, "That's mine. That's what's mine. All of it,
Elaina. Nobody gets your orgasms but me. Every one of them, they
belong to me."

She hung her head against him, completely
depleted of energy.
God, yes. If he could make her feel like
that, he could have them all.

An hour later, Raul leaned against the living
room wall next to Brian and vaguely listened to his friend talk
while he concentrated on Elaina across the crowded room.

She stood with a group of women that included
Janie and another young woman from town who was holding a baby
cuddled to her chest. He watched as Elaina and Janie cooed softly
to the baby and talked to the young mother.

Every so often, Elaina's eyes would fall on
him and he would see a soft blush encompass her face.

He had a sudden vision of her holding a baby,
cuddling it, nursing it.
His baby
.

Fierce possession ran through his blood.

The only thing calming him down and holding
him in place was the memory of her shimmering in his arms as orgasm
took over her body. It continued to play over and over in his
head.

Brian's voice droned on beside him as he too,
watched the women. "It's good to see Janie so happy again. She and
Elaina went through hell, man. Janie losing her only sister like
that--I can't even imagine. She was ten years older than Janie, and
Janie relied on her pretty much completely in an emotional sense.
And poor little Elaina. She took on the brunt of the care for her
mother. Three and a half years of it. She went from picking up her
high school diploma, to full-fledged caregiver."

Raul felt something splinter in his brain as
he turned his head to look fully into Brian's face.

"Three and a half years?" It was all Raul
could get out, and his flat voice was in no way indicative of the
confusion tearing him up inside.

"Yeah, man. It was bad. Janie wanted to give
Elaina a birthday party last year on her twenty-first, but there
was just no way at the time."

Raul felt sucker-punched, but managed to ask
another question, all the while reeling from the newly acquired
information. "When did her mother die?"

"Late July."

"And then Elaina started college?" Raul knew
his voice sounded empty, but it was the only way he could manage to
hang onto the conversation at all without losing it completely. He
felt his temper rise like volcanic pressure building inside of him,
getting ready to blow.

"Yeah, but she hates it, man. She's not going
back."

"And that's okay with you?"

"Well, I think she should get an education,
but Janie seems to think it's fine, so what the hell do I
know?"

"She can always go back when she decides what
she wants to do," Raul tried for an even tone, feeling his fists
clench the whole time.

"Yeah, but for now she needs some time to
heal. We never gave her that. We rushed her off to school in an
attempt to get her life back on track. I feel damn guilty for
that."

"You couldn't have known. You did what you
thought was best at the time," Raul responded in a gravelly
voice.

"Yeah," Brian agreed.

"I thought she was still a teenager," Raul
gritted out between his teeth, just as a loud
ping ping
ping
of firecrackers went off outside.

Brian straightened from his position next to
Raul to go investigate the noise. "No, man," his eyes held Raul's
in silent communication for a heartbeat. "She's twenty-two," he
said in a somber voice before he turned and walked off.

The back of Raul's head hit the wall and his
eyes closed briefly before opening again and staring across the
room at Elaina. Fury clouded his brain as he tried unsuccessfully
to reason with himself.
Yeah, it was a sad story
.
Yeah,
she'd had it rough. Yeah, she was still young.
But she had
lied
to him.

He went over and over their past
conversations in his head.
Had she
lied to him?

He couldn't come up with shit.

He didn't know the answer. But he suspected
he knew. She'd kept her true age a secret from him.

Why?

He knew he needed the answer to that
question. But for now, he couldn't seem to give a shit. He had only
one thought blaring in his brain.

She was twenty-two.

And that meant he could have her.

Now.

****

Elaina stared at herself in the bathroom
mirror as she washed her hands. The evening had been a complete
blur after she'd had that incredible orgasm. Raul had been amazing,
and he'd been watching her ever since
like a cat that was just
waiting to get the canary
.

Her heart pounded in her chest as she opened
the door to slip back to the party.

She stopped abruptly when she saw Raul
leaning against the wall in the hallway, obviously waiting on
her.

Her pulse thundered in her ears.

Her eyes held his in question as he reached
out a hand and ran a gentle finger down her cheek. Her breath
caught at the soft gesture.

And then he opened his mouth.

"You
twenty-two
years old
?" his
voice hissed out in a heated rush of anger.

Shock held her immobile as he lifted his hand
away from her face and moved back from her, crossing his arms and
leaning against the wall again, tension pouring off his body in
waves.

She swallowed hard and knew she was
trembling, but couldn't manage to get the constriction in her
throat to go away.

Her silence was evidently all the answer he
needed.

"Get your purse. And get a jacket, too. It's
cold out," his menacing voice made the innocuous words sound like a
threat.

She licked her lips.
This was it
.

She knew
this was it
. Raul was about
to take her away from here, strip her naked and claim her
virginity. Her body trembled. She was seriously about to lose her
virginity.
To Raul Vega
.

"Where--where are we going?" She asked the
question anyway, even though she already knew the answer.

"We're taking a drive."

She closed her eyes as the defining moment
washed over her.