Chapter 24
B eth tried to look away from Kane. She judged herself enough for believing in the foolish curse. She didn’t need to see disappointment or pity in his eyes, or worse, watch him walk away from her again.
“Why did you push me away that night in my bedroom when I was having a nightmare?” She dragged her gaze back to his, desperate for answers she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear. “I needed you and then you left me alone when I was scared. Why aren’t you pushing me away after I just admitted my darkest, stupidest secret?”
He backed her to the wall next to the garage door. “Because this time, when you’re begging me to fuck you, you’re awake and coherent.”
Her eyes widened so far they pooled with fresh tears. “I never begged you to fuck me.”
She hadn’t, had she?
“Yeah, you did.” He braced his arms against the wall and caged her in. “And it turned me on as much as it broke my heart because you were so scared.”
“I was scared, and maybe I did beg you, but going to the hospital brought back so many memories I’d worked so damn hard to suppress.” She lashed her hands onto his hips. Her fingers skimmed the line where steel warrior met soft flesh-and-bone, hard cowboy. “I needed this body you call super. I needed you to tell me it was going to be okay because when I was with you, before and after the nightmare, I believed that I was all right.” The passion in her voice deflated. “And then you left when I wasn’t.”
“Is that why you called Nic instead of me when you were scared at the bakery? Because you were mad I left you alone?” He gently stroked her cheek with his knuckles. “Walking away was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, but I didn’t leave. I went to my truck to get my phone charger. By the time I came back, you were passed out. I slept in your chair and watched you. Talked you through another dream and held your hand. You never woke up, but you calmed down enough to fall back into a restful sleep.”
“I think I remember that.” Her words came out low and sultry, her heart beating in rhythm with his labored breaths and her mind reeling in disbelief. A snippet she’d forgotten teetered on the edge of her memory. “Did you call me sugarplum?”
He stroked the iridescent collar of her coat. “You wore this when I took you to the hospital and you looked as sweet as my favorite candy. I spent all night wondering if you tasted sweeter. And then you kissed me, and I knew it was true and I wanted more. So much fucking more, but even if I had let myself take what you offered, I was afraid I couldn’t give you what you needed.”
“What did you think I needed?” She held her breath, praying the cocky cowboy answered instead of the serious protector.
“Not for me to fulfill every dirty fantasy I’ve had about you. ”
“I wish you would have.” She pressed her palm against the bulge in his pants.
A pleading moan skated from his throat as she slid her palms up his chest and over abs so defined she could feel every glorious indent under his shirt. Venturing outward, she followed the fascinating V of his torso to his hips and back down to his thighs.
He cursed under his breath. “My leg is made of steel, not the rest of me. I didn’t trust myself not to touch you. You’re too fucking hot and I care about you too much.”
She jerked her hand away from his erection like it might stab her. Caring for her could lead to a graveyard with his name etched on a tombstone.
“Come back to me, sugarplum.” He slipped his fingers into her hair and manacled the base of her neck to stop her from pulling away. “Tell me where your mind went just now.”
She shook her head.
“Beth.”
That commanding tone renewed the pounding desire in her veins. God, she wanted, needed every side of Kane so much she ached, but she wasn’t made of steel either, especially her heart.
As she tried to push past him, he spun her to face the wall. “Remember what I said I’d do at your parents’ house if you didn’t listen?”
She not only remembered the conversation. She replayed it on a regular basis.
Pressing his chest into her back, he nestled his hard cock between her ass cheeks as he gathered her wrists and pinned them above her head. “I’ll give you a reminder. It had to do with making your ass as red as the front door.” Dipping his head, he nipped at the sensitive skin below her ear. “Trust me, sugarplum, the effects from a sharp bite of pain and the ensuing pleasure can be a wonder drug.”
White-hot heat blazed between her legs. Apparently, fear hadn’t completely overtaken her senses. “Jesus, Kane, I thought you were a country gentleman.”
“Not in the bedroom, sweetheart. Tell me what upset you so we can get to the part where I make you scream my name again.”
“I didn’t scream…”
He spun her to him. “Oh yes, you did, darlin’, loud enough for Rita and Jerry next door to?—”
A pop louder than any gunshot she’d ever heard rocked the small house. She spun her head to the garage door as it imploded inward. The force pushed her backward. Her head smacked into the refrigerator. Bright spots flashed in her vision as Kane shoved her. Like at the cemetery, he rolled a second before they hit the floor and took the brunt of the impact. Less than a heartbeat later, breath whooshed from her lungs in a painful rush as her shoulders slammed into a cabinet.
Heat poured in from the garage and scorched her face. As she pulled in her next breath, she coughed. Clamping a hand over her mouth, she tried to stop the smoke inhalation, but her throat burned like it was on fire.
Kane rolled off her and nudged her toward the back door. “Stay down,” he yelled over the crackle of flames.
Eyes tearing, she crawled behind him across the linoleum. The hem of her dress caught on the leg of the metal kitchen table. The material ripped as something sharp cut up her thigh. She cursed but kept moving. A wall of smoke greeted her as she emerged just feet from the back door, but the distance to fresh air seemed like miles.
Kane stood, his steady hands guiding her up as they reached their escape route. Flames consumed the wallpaper and licked precariously close to his back, but he shielded her from the destruction. As he yanked the door open, his pants leg caught fire.
“Kane.” The words scraped up her throat like sandpaper, but she kept yelling. Was his super leg fireproof? The rest of him sure as hell wasn’t.
He roared something unintelligible as he yanked her out the back door. Cool air hit her face as he pulled her into the vast, fenceless yard. They tumbled onto the snowy grass. Air trapped in her lungs as Kane sprang back up and pulled her with him. The tattered remains of her dress tangled around her waist. Blood dripped from a long cut on her thigh, and she’d lost a shoe.
He tore off his T-shirt and handed it to her. “Tie this around your leg.”
She kicked off the other heel, barely feeling the cold, wet grass under her feet or the pain in her thigh, and quickly tied the shirt around the wound. As she straightened, he pressed a gun into her hand. Adrenaline pumping, she wrapped her fingers around the warm metal and cocked it.
Kane would not be number four if she had anything to say about it.
Kane screamed the command in his brain to activate himself into phase two. As the sting dashed from his neck down his leg, he squeezed Beth’s hand and pulled her to the side of the house that wasn’t consumed by fire yet.
“Kane, do you copy?”
Ryan’s voice roared in Kane’s ears. “Copy.”
“Incoming hostiles from the east and west.”
“How many?”
“One in a vehicle in the front. Six approaching the house. Three from each side. They arrived in a van seconds after the explosion.”
“Copy.” The police and fire department would be here any minute. The hostiles’ best strategy would be to draw them out and grab Beth before the authorities arrived, which meant they were coming in full force with the intent to kill.
You can’t be number four.
He tuned out the memory of Beth’s desperate voice and surveyed the surroundings. There was nowhere to take cover in the barren backyard except for a shed on the edge of the cornfield. Sprinting to that was too risky.
That only left one choice.
Engage.
“Three hostiles approaching from each side of the house.” He pointed to the gun in Beth’s hand as he yelled over the flames. “Stay behind me and shoot at the first one you see, but don’t move from your position.”
“Where’s your gun? Why do we only have one gun?”
“Trust me and listen like your life depends on it because it does.” He pushed her into a crouch and leveled her with a look that said, “Stay here.”
She nodded at the silent command. The fear in her eyes stamped itself into his mind. Her trust branded his heart.
“They’re rounding the house through the flames on the east side,” Ryan said.
Kane channeled enough intensity to blow up another truck into his silent command.
Fire. Fire. Fire.
V-Strikes meant to kill speared through the flames. One hostile came into sight on the outskirts of the inferno. Kane hit him with a strike to the heart. The hostile’s gun went off and the shot went wide.
“Hostiles rounding the corner on the west.”
Another shot sounded behind him. He whirled to Beth to shove her to the ground. Instead, he whispered her name in awe and fear as he watched her raise the gun and hit a burly figure square in the chest.
Shoving her toward the house, he stepped into the open. He ignored her shout to get back as he envisioned the destruction he aimed to rain down. With a growl, he fired a V-Strike toward a hostile on the east side. The target fell to his knees. A bullet from Beth had him crumpling face-first into the grass.
“Hostiles on your six,” Ryan said.
Without turning around, Kane fired V-Strikes from the back of his thighs. Beth’s bullets punctuated his efforts as more V-Strikes streamed from the front of his calves toward another hostile in his sight line. A moment later, a quick scan assured all reported threats were neutralized, at least for the time being.
“All clear ,” Ryan said.
Adrenaline galloped through him as he pulled Beth from where she’d taken cover behind a rusty garbage bin. Sirens wailed in the distance.
“SUV is fleeing. Nic is minutes out. He’ll meet you at the road on the far side of the cornfield.”
Kane acknowledged Ryan as he grabbed Beth’s hand and took off. As he pulled her into the barren field, snow poured down in a sheet of white. She cried out as she stumbled on the prickly ground. He scooped her into his arms and took off in a run.
As he crunched through cornstalk remnants, one thought kept running through his mind.
He couldn’t be number four any more than Beth could be the next Jenna.