6. Dane
DANE
I wake to the bite of cold, and the knowledge that something’s wrong. I feel different. Not necessarily bad, but far from normal.
Opening my eyes a crack. Stone walls, a fire that’s more embers and ash than flame, some rough wooden furniture. The cottage. The helicopter crash. Being drugged.
Stephie. My heart gets an electric shock as I realise she’s nowhere to be seen.
“Stephie!” It comes out as half-shout, half-croak.
“I’m here!” My little assistant pushes open the door to the cabin and shakes snow from her feet. She’s in bloody high heels. This is insanity. It’s not the place for her. In her arms she carries a couple of small logs.
“We used up the rest last night,” she explains brightly.
Relief cascades through me. She’s okay. And she seems far less fuzzy-headed than me.
My cock twitches as she kneels beside the fire and puts a log onto it, and I’m instantly aware that I’m sticky. I throw myself up into a sitting position, at the same time as realising my trousers and underwear are around my thighs, and my shirt is partly unbuttoned.
And I can’t remember how it happened.
“Thank you for getting fuel. Are you okay? Did you sleep alright?”
Stephie has her back turned, tending the fire. I slide my hand down beneath the rugs we were sleeping under, and brush it over my stomach. My skin is tight. Almost crispy.
Fuck. That’s semen. Every man knows the feel of it, dried on his skin. My heart racing and guilt clogging my nose and mouth, I hastily straighten my clothes and grasp in my memory for what happened last night.
There’s... It’s hazy.
Whatever I was drugged with was—is—serious shit.
My recollections are in tatters. The early evening is fairly clear, I held it together.
But after eating, it all gets choppy, and I can’t tell what was real and what wasn’t.
There are snippets of impossible things.
Me, on top of Stephie. Her legs around my thighs as she urges me deeper and faster.
Rolling bliss as I came inside her. Kisses.
Her soft hair in my hand and the scent of her shampoo as we slept entwined.
The same thoughts I’ve had for four years, since she started working for me.
“What happened last night?” I snap.
“What?” She turns and blinks at me.
“Did I...” I can’t bring myself to ask if I forced myself on her. Surely I wouldn’t? But that drug. And I’ve wanted her for so long.
Her brow furrows. “You were there.” She gives a huff of “that’s obvious”.
“I can’t remember,” I admit.
Her jaw drops open, and her mouth is a perfect little “o”. So tempting. But the shock on her face is devastating. “You said you were fine.”
“I thought I was. But it seems to have blurred my memory.” Except for my fantasies. Those are vivid, if disjointed.
She can tell I’m lying. Or, that I’m partly lying, and I can remember the ravings of an insane mind picking out a vision of what I want most, and I have evidence on my stomach that something occurred.
“We just went to sleep,” she says, fussing with the fire and not looking at me.
“We laid together for warmth?” I check, and she nods quickly.
That’s not all though. She’s blushing.
“I’m sorry if being drugged led to any,” I pick my words carefully, “out of character behaviour last night.” Including but not limited to jacking off while you were right next to me, pressuring you to have sex with a man almost twice your age that you couldn’t say no to because you were in the middle of nowhere in a blizzard and he’s your boss, or even outright...
I wouldn’t have done that. I’m sure I wouldn’t.
However much I crave her, I wouldn’t take her when she didn’t want it.
Though drugs can make people crazy and misinterpret situations. A rock forms in my stomach.
She’s frozen in place, like a deer in headlights.
“I’m sorry. I don’t know what I did.” My throat is dry with remorse. I’ve hurt her, and for four long years, that’s exactly what I’ve tried to avoid. “Tell me.”
“No.” she shakes her head, almost violently.
“Stephie,” I say seriously. “I need to know—”
“Nothing happened.” She looks me right in the eyes, and I can tell she’s lying. If the evidence weren’t all over my belly from my traitorous cock, it would be clear in her face. Not to anyone else, but to me. She’s a competent liar—she has to be for this job—but I know her.
“Nothing.” I don’t hide my scepticism.
“We cuddled a bit for warmth, and then you moved further away once I was warm.”
To wank myself? That’s horribly plausible.
It lines up with what’s in my memories, more than the idea that Stephie was enthusiastically clutching me and whimpering as I fucked her tight, hot pussy.
If I gave in to an illusion and wanked off while looking at her, and maybe being too close, it would also explain why Stephie is keen to emphasise that nothing happened.
Technically nothing did.
And a horrible conclusion slides into my mind. What if she felt me wanking off, not saw? What if she was horrified and humiliated by my hard-on, which I have no doubt was pressed into her.
I do remember that. Holding her. Trying to calm my heart rate.
I must have taken advantage, and fuck, fuck! That’s the last thing I wanted. I need Stephie to be happy and comfortable with me.
“Honestly, it’s fine,” she says, her face finally smoothing into that mask of professionalism.
I don’t believe her, but I breathe a shaky sigh of relief.
I might have embarrassed her, but if I didn’t do anything she didn’t want, that’s okay.
Touching Stephie is not for the likes of me. I just employ her and take care of her. Claiming my much younger, sweet assistant, is a step too far.
I nod slowly. “Good. Did you manage to sleep?”
“Yes.” Her gaze slides away, and I can’t tell what she’s thinking. “Are you feeling alright now?” she asks, standing and brushing her hands on her wide-leg trousers.
Memory of pushing her knickers down flashes through me. The feel of the fabric. The silk of her skin.
But it’s generic. An illusion summoned by my drugged mind.
“Much better,” I lie. There’s a barrier between us now that wasn’t there before. I stand and grabbing my phone from where I left it last night, turn it back on. “Let’s get out of here,” I mutter.
“Yeah, there’s no television. Can’t survive with that,” she jokes awkwardly. That’s a lie too, because I know that she prefers to read than watch anything.
I ignore the twinge of unease and hold the phone up. Nothing.
“I’m going to find some signal. Stay here until I return.”
I refuse the blanket Stephie tries to insist I take with me, because she needs it more than I do, staying still whereas I’ll be moving.
She attempts to come with me, so I snap at her.
I’ve put her in enough danger without trudging through the snow again.
And if Volk are out there, looking for us, I’d rather she was in here. Safer.
Leaving my heart with Stephie in the cabin, I walk away.
Outside, the cloud has lifted, and it has stopped snowing. A good sign. The burned-out helicopter is just within sight. I scowl at it, the knowledge of having lost two of my best men and how close I was to losing Stephie produces an overwhelming surge of grief and anger.
Then I go in the opposite direction. Up the hill.
I stumble on the snowy ground, holding my phone out the whole time, as though signal is something I can catch, and I’m a hunter of the digital era.
The sound of the helicopter catches me off-guard.
For a second, I consider running. Shooting. All my protective instincts have been triggered. This could be Volk, come to finish the job. Then I recognise it. That’s a Beckton helicopter, and it’s heading for the crash site.
The next few hours are relief and regret. I practically drag Stephie out of the cottage, and to the helicopter with absolute clarity.
I can’t lose her because of a stupid moment of weakness, and I have a lot of revenge to execute.
I know, for sure, that there’s only one way to fix this. No more cosy excuses to be near her with foreign trips. I’m giving Stephie the respect she deserves. And maybe the room to heal.