White Heat (3 page)

“So for the moment, I guess we’re both stuck here together.” He folded his arms and pursed his lips.

“I’m resilient,” she said, folding her own arms. “If you can deal with it, so can I.”

“Well, then. I guess we’re here for the duration. There’s enough food and water, so we should be OK.” He yawned, and saw her looking at his mouth. He recognized that look. Desire.

CHAPTER SIX

Dugan knew he was shrewd rather than bright, although he had attended college and even—with the help of special programs—graduated. He felt the sharp edge of lust and had a sudden urge that he was not sure he could control.

Right now, glaring out at the wall of white, gusting storm that blocked his egress, he cursed, then slammed a massive fist against the wooden table. His six foot four inch frame felt trapped inside the confined space of the low-ceilinged cabin.

When he played semi-pro ball, he had turned his anger against his opponents, hammering them until he was thrown out of the league for unsportsmanlike conduct. He still did not understand why they’d kicked him out; football was not a game for wimps or sissies. Even the military did not suit him because of their damn regimentation. He shook his head, barely kept himself from smashing the table yet again. And he had loved the job he wrangled with the L.A. Police, aided by a former football buddy. He liked being called
officer
, relished unleashing violent urges which were sanctioned by his shiny badge.

But the bastards had dishonorably discharged him after only eighteen months. Thinking about the injustice, the stupid complaints about his “brutality” still infuriated him. He grinned suddenly; before they discharged him, he beat the hell out of the sergeant who had instigated them all against him. Memories of the man’s frightened eyes and busted chops still brought him great satisfaction.

Nevertheless, he enjoyed his freelance work, both as bodyguard and bounty hunter, which he found quite lucrative, and where the rules were few and unenforced. This work demanded both strength and ferocity, and he knew he had both. It allowed him to support a wife as good looking as Carol. Why then had she left him? He shook his head; it didn’t make sense. Carol was innocent and used to passive and sexually immature men; Dugan knew that his aggressiveness and ferocity had actually attracted her to him, at least in the beginning.

Staring out the window, he glowered at the storm and fumed about the way his beloved wife had snuck out like a bitch, deserting him. Unconsciously he clenched his fists until his knuckles hardened like rock. He loved that she looked so Ivy League and proper but had those luscious tits and juicy buttocks that made him hot, that scorched his rising sap and which he knew needed his tending. He flashed a smile. And then, the way she got dewy-eyed and glowing whenever he thrust out his chiseled chest and flexed his arms…that admiration made him feel special; filled the emptiness inside and eased his loneliness. He remembered meeting her on the sandy beach in Malibu. He’d hit it big in Vegas and was relaxing, working out under the sun clad only in a bathing suit. Horniness swelled his crotch and he ached with desire when she wiggled by, all sunburned and oily, her curvy ass a field of dreams, a turf he’d love to plow. Then she stopped dead as if she’d never seen a real man’s body close up and sweaty. He laughed to himself, recalling how he smart-mouthed her while she gawked at his pecs, his abs, her mouth pink and open wide, as if already hot for his tongue. Then he tensed his biceps, made them swell, curling the barbell as she watched his muscles rippling. He had lain in the sun for hours until his sallow skin was richly tan and glossy the way he knew women liked it. And Carol had stared at his tawny body as if hypnotized.

And that was how it started. He sweet-talked her into a date. She stuttered like a ’tween, her skin matching the color of her cherry as he loomed over her, the spittle from his mouth a spray of heat; then, lowering his voice he flirted, flicked his hands under her skirt and drew the panties down and the blouse up. His bass tones rattled her, addled her brain. And then he did the deed, grunting and ramming his dick hard into her; and then she was no longer a virgin. That made her his, despite her parent’s harsh, repeated protestations, which only fueled her love and her resolve. He had done it with a virgin, and that made him prouder than a king.

Chortling now with recollection, despite the wall of snow that blocked his exit, he smiled, reaching for his dick. It was then he recollected that he had no place soft and moist to stick it. He missed her, missed the freewheeling sex, her passivity that allowed him to do whatever he wished, to pleasure himself with the lushness of her body until even he was exhausted.

He remembered giving her the ring, a diamond from a slick pawnshop. Then, when he saw her face was damp with tears as well as perspiration, he gentled her, stroking her hair, whispering “my darling sugarplum.” And then he rammed her hard in bed. The roses were an added touch that he was still proud of.

And during their honeymoon, she was loving it like heroin; she was a sex addict just like him. But, after a time, her feelings seemed to slip. Marriage was for keeps, forever. Didn’t she know that? He swore under his breath. Bitches he’d had before, but none like this; none had her class, her skin, her breeding. His manhood boiled and swelled his pride.

And so, he took her far up north where they’d be alone without distraction, where there’d be no one she could turn to except for him. She questioned it, but didn’t complain. And then, up where the air was cold, his dick got rigid and his body raged. The pleasure overwhelmed him, made him frenzied as he savored her, ravished her breasts, drilled down her cunt until she cried out even as he pierced her. Had he gone too far?

Though he apologized for hurting her, for the bewildering fury of his lust, her feelings for him appeared to change a lot. Bruised and weeping, she withdrew. From then on, she was passive as he humped her, even cried aloud in agony each time he stuck his dick in her. And now, she was gone.

Sitting there alone at the table, his back hunched, he curled his broad lips under his teeth as he tried hard not to grind them. He had been a grinder since grade school, despite trying fruitlessly to stop it. Anxiety over his father’s beatings, over the lessons at school he couldn’t understand, over the urges his mother throttled, had triggered the habit. The surge of rage overwhelmed him. A molar cracked as he ground down hard, then furious, he smashed a chair against the wall. A wooden leg broke off and splintered in his face, leaving a gash. Blood trickled down the stubble on his chin, but he merely scowled.

He’d had to chain her to him and lock up her cell phone. She started calling home, and he couldn’t allow it. His temper flared again. Picking up the broken chair leg, he snapped it in two. Glancing out the frosted window, he saw the storm had not abated. By the time it stopped, she might be anywhere. Perhaps she was dead, lying frozen solid in a snowdrift somewhere.

For a moment, the thought of her rotting and bleeding cheered him up. But then he realized it would mean he would never see her again; that he would never fondle her soft tits, paddle that sweet vanilla ass—

No
. His thinking raged uncomfortably. She must be alive out there; she must have taken shelter. Yes, she was alive. But where? And, how would he find her?

Absently, he rubbed his palms together, as if the friction would spark a plan. His nails were long and dirty, and needed cutting. Fidgeting, he pulled out a blade, began trimming the cuticles. The Bowie was an old friend, his favorite sticker. He remembered she had taken his smartphone too, ripped him off while he was sleeping, wiped out and drugged from sex. Clever bitch. He shook his head.

Then a thought occurred to him.
That stupid whore
. He could track her using GPS. He was not a physicist, but he knew a little electronics, a bit about computer systems. Cell phones were two-way radios, sending and receiving. The GPS-assisted ones, like that bitch had stolen, were even more sophisticated: they could send and receive from orbital satellites. And while even GPS devices might be difficult to locate in cities crowded and dense, in the wilderness here, there was nothing to block triangulation.

Feeling good, he jerked off until he spouted like a fountain against the wall, then watched the viscous liquid trickling down like diluted custard. His mind dredged up a phrase:
how sweet it is…
He slammed the table with his fist.

It didn’t matter how long the storm lasted. She couldn’t hide from him as long as she had the stolen cell phone. He could find her easily. Even call her if he wanted to.

He smacked his lips loudly.
Hi sweet cheeks, it’s hubby. How you been
? He began laughing wildly.

No, no, that wouldn’t do. He wouldn’t call. That would just warn her, and then she might think to ditch the phone. He would bide his time. Find her and take her fast, before she had a chance to escape. Yep, the rich Ivy League bitch thought she was clever, thought she could outsmart him; but she was not as clever as she thought—no, not as clever as he was. He would find his woman, find her and teach her manners, her proper place. Then poke it in so hard she’d love it.

No, there was no hurry, no hurry at all. He ate some cold leftover chicken straight from the bone, chewing even the skin, then washed it down with lukewarm Heineken. Yes, when he found her, he would give that piece of ass a good, sound beating; then he would fuck the hell out of her.

CHAPTER SEVEN

The curtain arrangement was Carol’s idea, an image resurrected from a classic movie. Josh had jury-rigged a makeshift telescoping metal rod between two walls of the cabin. Over the rod, he hung a curtain of heavy opaque green vinyl to divide the room. She had asked him to do this and now she’d have the privacy she badly needed when she slept, disrobed, or attended to personal grooming. He agreed that she was right. The small bathroom with its clasp lock afforded some privacy, but a woman alone in a small cabin with a strange man needed safe personal space.

He had also spread out a sleeping bag he said was often used outdoors in snow. He placed the bag in the far corner of his side of the curtain, as far away from the bed as possible in the cramped quarters, and he told her that was where he planned to sleep while she was there. She pondered this, at first doubting his motives, even though he seemed sincere.

Yes, she guessed she’d be OK with him sleeping there, at least for a while. That is, unless… She blinked; and the rash, lascivious thought faded. Had her brain been poisoned by the sex with Dugan? Was his sexual promiscuity contagious? Or was she lonelier than she imagined…

She was troubled by the predicament of being alone with a virile man full-time in the close quarters of the small cabin for several days, maybe longer. They needed to forestall temptation. When he agreed to put up the curtain as a barrier, she was relieved.

While maybe not the most sensitive man, he was much more aware than Dugan, and he seemed to care about her feelings and was eager to set her mind at ease. Yet she sensed from the faint flush in his cheek, the dilation of his pupils, that she aroused him.

Again, that whimsical, perverted idea hit her—he was attractive; his physique was stimulating, even diverting. Surprised at herself, she shook her head. The freezing cold and the awful isolation had obviously turned up her oven’s heat and aggravated her libido.

She had just run away from an obsessive, almost feral husband. She would be insane to spread her thighs for another stranger’s pulsing insertion. Experience had taught her better, or so she hoped. Still, her lips were dry, and her throat was tight. She took a breath and sighed.

“Is everything OK?” he asked, raising his voice so that she could hear him through the thick curtain of material that hung between them.

“Yes, yes, thank you,” she said.

She ran her fingers through her tangle of hair. She knew this wasn’t the most comfortable arrangement for him. Not that he seemed to mind the sleeping bag. He told her that he was used to roughing it and didn’t mind the floor. But having her there, half naked at times, and sleeping on the other side of a curtain, must be quite provocative for a single man. She was sensitive and bright—notwithstanding her bad judgment in her choice of husband.

She guessed that he had things to hide, a history he didn’t want exposed that might be discovered if she was inquisitive and nosed around. Maybe he’d even mutter loudly in his sleep, and reveal his secrets. A part of her was curious; another told her to let it lie. There was no obvious way that she could figure it out from anything in the cabin, but experience had taught her that secrets were dangerous.

“By the way,” she said, parting the curtain so she could speak to him. “I’m Carol. Who are you?”

“Jeremy. But my friends call me Josh.”

“Thanks, Josh. I appreciate it.”

After she closed the curtain, she heard the quiet shuffle of him taking off his shirt and stripping to his shorts; then the banging as he began his daily exercise routine. After ten minutes, she smelled the thick and dizzying pungency of sweat that must be dripping off his muscled chest.

Carol started at his heavy breathing, the bellowing grunts and moans that echoed like passion. As if in response, her breathing grew deeper, and her nipples tightened. She heard him puffing from exertion, and couldn’t resist peeking through a small hole in the curtain.

She gasped. He was lifting a heavy metal pipe, wielding it like a barbell. She watched as his torso strained, turning tawnier as blood pumped to his chest and fed his straining biceps. His pecs were sweaty slabs, twitching and expanding with his effort. She heard him snort like a bull; then as he made a massive effort, his biceps grew even larger and bulged like living marble.

She watched as he raised and lowered the bar up and down, pumping it; saw his chest expand like molten steel and saw the damp pale hair plastered to his abdomen. His tongue flicked out, licked at his compressed lips as he slowly lowered the weight to the ground. His body shivered, hard and well-defined as muscles shifted underneath pale skin that looked like silken armor. Her vision focused on the thick, corded muscle in his legs that were veined with squiggly veins; then, it wavered with the ripple of his bulky, sweaty shoulders.