10. Bound to You
SOUNDTRACK: Worship by Saint Vice
~ GRACE ~
The night felt like endless hours of running, calling, my heart squeezed in a slipknot that tightened my chest.
I couldn’t measure time. The air grew colder, but my body continued to thrum with heat, and now that sensitized flesh between my thighs pulsed, and my lower stomach ached, painfully hollow.
The dragons sang and called in waves. One of them roared. But, even when they quieted, the drive never stopped. I kept hearing the memory of his voice in my head.
Grace… God, Grace. I need you. Please. This is torture.
Was it him? Or only my body wishing for him?
Unable to answer, and unable to deny him, I stumbled through the trees, pausing at times to catch my breath and assess that tug in my chest, adjust my line, then push forward again.
Each time the dragons rose to their peak, my mind turned back, flashing between Vane kissing and touching me, and that incredible, impossible wave of pleasure when I’d thought of him and touched myself in the cave.
I wanted that feeling again—my body demanded it with every step—but I wanted it with him. He pulled at me, and even though I hated myself for it after the way he’d spat disgust at me. Yet, the drive so unrelenting, I couldn’t deny it. I couldn’t deny him.
Then, he came alive inside my chest, nestled right alongside my heart.
I staggered to a halt, one hand to my breastbone, gasping. But even though I shook with disbelief, there was no denying, he was there.
“Vane?” I murmured his name, confused and afraid, and still pleading.
And that space in my heart pulsed.
I stumbled forward.
The dragons were asleep and some semblance of sanity had returned. Yet, my body ached with weariness and hunger. I couldn’t stop looking for him and cursing whatever it was that kept us apart. Was he moving? Or was I just a poor measure of the direction he lay in?
Nearly an hour later, dawn crept up, the faintest line of gray to silhouette the mountains against the sky, when I finally found him.
I’d been confused—my chest insisting he was further down the hillside, while the land sloped up.
I’d been running circles without realizing it, until, in my frustration, I broke the spiral and pushed to the summit in an attempt to gain a view—only to discover the deceptive hollow, a soft crater, before it continued up to the mountains.
Vane had hidden himself in it.
Water flowed from the mountain peak above, pooling in a small swimming hole. It smelled fresh. Probably why he’d chosen this spot.
My throat was parched and I ached for a drink—but not as deeply as I ached for him.
I stumbled forward again.
From that moment, I would forever associate the sound of rushing water with the poignant joy—and terror—of finding him.
He’d found a pair of trees growing from a shared root structure so their trunks rose in opposing sides of a V. Using harness straps and slipknots, he’d tied each of his wrists to those trunks.
To my horror, he was on his knees, bent over his own thighs so that the longer hair on top of his head fell forward to brush his knees, his shoulders were craned back, arms wrenched up behind because he’d tied his wrists to the trees while standing.
At first sight, I was terrified he’d injured himself. But when his name escaped my lips, his head snapped up and we both froze.
He peered at me out from behind those messy, sweaty strands of hair, teeth gritted, lips tight as he sucked air between his teeth. His dirty, smeared cheeks were shadowed with stubble, and his hands clenched the bonds.
“What did you do?” I wailed.
“Don’t untie me!” he rasped, snapping upright as I started toward him again, his shoulders heaving.
“But—”
“I can’t control it, Grace,” he snarled. “The need is too strong. I’ll hurt you. You can’t untie me!”
A tumult of conflicting emotions clawed through me, fighting each other over my heart as I slowed my steps again.
He was concerned for my safety?
He thought he was the danger? He’d tied himself up to stop himself touching me?
He begged me to leave him tied?
Yet, he looked like a caged animal.
This close, I could feel more than the need. I could sense him. He wanted me as desperately as I wanted him, but didn’t trust himself? Why?
I inched closer so I wouldn’t startle him. His eyes went round and his throat bobbed, but I lifted my hands to soothe him as I would a frightened horse, and kept going.
“I’ll get you a drink and—look, there’s blood on your wrist!”
“Unless you want to be rutted upon like a wild beast, don’t touch me!”
I flinched and he hissed a curse as his head sagged forward again. “You can’t help, Grace,” he croaked, shaking his head so his hair swayed. “I’m sorry… but, please, leave me.”
I had to set my jaw and force my body to move past him at a wide berth, though everything in me screamed to draw closer.
My heart was a compass for his as I cast around for some kind of vessel.
Something, anything, so I could get him water, cursing myself for not thinking of the small cups that were back in the cave.
Neither of us had come prepared for this.
In the end, I pulled one of the wide, leathery leaves off a plant growing next to the water and cupped it in both hands like a bowl.
Dipping it into the stream, I carried it, dripping the whole way, to tip it against his cracked lips.
It took everything within me not to stroke his jaw when he opened his mouth and stared at me as he raised his chin and gulped frantically.
His Adam’s apple leaped as he swallowed.
It was such a uniquely masculine sight, I yearned to run a finger down from the cleft of his chin, over that sharp lump, to the divot between his collarbones, down to the flat planes of his broad chest—
“Fuck, Grace. Stop. Please.”
I stared at him, the leaf empty of its precious refreshment, and Vane’s dark eyes, tormented storms, locked on me.
“Sorry,” I whispered and darted off to get more water.
It took several trips to get enough water down his throat to slake his thirst. Only then did I kneel next to the running creek and drink until my stomach tightened.
When I returned to him, I couldn’t help but place myself half a step closer. His eyes widened in alarm, but the dragons were waking, and I knew—
“Thank you. For the water. But you have to go. The dragons are waking. It’s about to get worse again.”
I shook my head. “I’m not leaving you here like… like this. Alone.”
“You don’t understand—”
“No, I don’t. I don’t understand any of this. But I know I need to be close to you, and standing here is easier than being anywhere I can’t see you. And you’ll need help.”
His jaw rolled and he shook his head. “No, Grace. I’m not being noble. I’m telling you, it’s not safe.” The last two words were ragged, growled through his teeth and his body shuddered.
A surge of need rippled behind my navel.
His hands shot out, as if he’d grab me. I startled, but the leather straps caught him and he groaned, dropping his head again.
The dragons.
My mouth went dry as my mind flashed on that moment he’d first kissed me, and his hand slipping into my shirt—
“Grace! I’m begging you… I can’t do this!”
Dawn was rising, the sky turning rosy, the shadows gray instead of black—the dirt and scrapes on his cheeks coming into sharp focus.
I wanted to weep at the hunted look in his eyes, in the same moment I took in the way his shoulders strained against the leather of his jacket and his knuckles turned white because he clenched those straps so hard.
He was strong, and capable. And dangerous.
“Why would you—?” I whispered.
“It protects both of us,” he muttered.
“But, I can’t leave you here.”
“You have to.”
“But—”
“LEAVE ME!”
I flinched again, that dark little spot in my heart shriveling again. But even as tears of exhaustion and hurt welled once more, I saw the despair shadow his features, watched him deflate.
He dropped his head, his shoulders heaving. “Please, Grace. This isn’t a game. I’m trying to do the right thing… for you. For both of us. Please.”
A little sob broke in my throat as I nodded.
God was going to have a lot to answer to, for this day.
But as the sun broke over the mountains and the sky turned gold, as Vane’s breath became a rasp, and dragon song rose behind us, tangling in my heart and veins, there was an irresistible drive in me as well.
Without his permission, I cupped his stubbled cheeks in both hands, tipped his face up, and when his eyes fluttered closed on a groan, I laid my lips against his for one, pure, breathless moment.
“Mine,” I whispered on a half-strangled sob as his breath rushed out of him. “I’ll come back next time they sleep.”
When I straightened, his eyes were wide again, dark, and startled. But he didn’t speak. I kissed him once more, then let him go and backed up.
“I’ll find food,” I mumbled numbly. “And more water. Just call for me. I won’t go far. I can’t. I have to stay close. But I won’t… I won’t free you,” I whispered.
Then I turned and ran until I was deep enough into the trees that I couldn’t see him, and I could weep without a witness.