Chapter 4 #2
I'm on my feet and crossing to her before conscious thought catches up with instinct. My hands close on her shoulders, turning her to face me. She's falling apart right here, the compartmentalization breaking down, all the terror and exhaustion and fear flooding in at once.
"Breathe." I keep my voice low, steady. Command wrapped in something that might be comfort if I knew how to offer it. "You're safe. Right now, in this moment, you're safe."
She looks up at me. Eyes wide. Pupils blown. Breath coming too fast. On the edge of hyperventilating.
"Breathe with me." I demonstrate, slow inhale through the nose, slower exhale through the mouth. "Match my rhythm."
She tries. Fails. Tries again. Her body is still shaking, adrenaline crash hitting hard, months of isolation and careful research destroyed in hours, everything she thought she knew about the world shattered by footage of women being trafficked and men with guns hunting her through wilderness.
And then she's kissing me. Or I'm kissing her. Can't tell who moved first. Doesn't matter.
Her mouth crashes against mine with desperate hunger, all that fear and need and survival instinct twisted into raw desire. I taste blood where she bit her lip during the chase. Taste desperation. Taste life affirming itself in the most basic way possible.
I should stop this. Should push her away and remind her that we're partners in survival, not lovers, and mixing those things up is how people make fatal mistakes.
Instead I kiss her back just as hard. Fist my hand in her hair and angle her head exactly how I want it.
Take her mouth like I'm claiming territory.
Because that's what this is. Possession.
Need. The dark satisfaction of having her here, alive, mine in a way that has nothing to do with rescue and everything to do with conquest.
She makes a sound against my mouth. Not protest. Encouragement. Her hands grip my shoulders, nails digging in through the fabric of my shirt. Holding on. Meeting me.
I walk her backward until she hits the log wall. The impact jars us both but she doesn't stop kissing me. If anything, she kisses harder, all that scientific control shattering into pure need.
"Turn around." My voice comes out rough. Commanding.
She hesitates for half a heartbeat. Then she turns, palms flattening against the rough wood. Breath coming fast. Shaking. But not from fear.
I press against her back, letting her feel exactly how hard I am. How much I want to bury myself inside her and claim her in the most primal way possible. One hand spans her hip, holding her in place. The other slides up her spine to tangle in her hair again.
"I'm clean." My voice comes out rough. "You?"
"Yes. And I have an IUD." Her voice shakes but the words are clear. "I'm protected."
That's all I need to hear.
My hands move to her jeans, working the button and zipper with efficiency born of urgency.
I don't strip her completely. Don't have the patience for it.
Just shove denim and underwear down to her thighs, baring her ass and exposing her to my view.
She's already wet. I can see it, smell it, the evidence of her arousal making my cock throb with need.
She braces harder against the wall, arching back into me. Offering herself. The submission in that motion flips some primal switch that makes everything narrow down to this moment, this woman, this need.
I free myself from my own jeans, wrapping my hand around my cock and stroking once. Twice. Getting myself ready. Then I position myself at her entrance, feeling her heat against my tip, and thrust into her in one hard stroke that tears gasps from both our throats.
She's tight. So goddamn tight it's almost painful. Her body grips me like a fist, inner muscles clenching around my cock as she adjusts to the invasion. I feel every flutter, every clench, every desperate attempt her body makes to accommodate my size.
"Fuck." The word rips from my throat. She feels better than anything has a right to feel. Hot and wet and perfect around me.
I don't give her time to adjust. Don't have the control for gentleness. Just pull back and slam in again, setting a brutal pace that has her gasping and bracing harder against the wall.
"God." The word tears from her throat as I start moving in earnest. Hard. Fast. Deep. Giving her everything the moment demands. No mercy. No softness. Just raw need and the affirmation of being alive when death came so close.
The sound of skin slapping against skin fills the cabin. Obscene. Primal. Real. Her ass bounces with each thrust, flesh rippling as I drive into her again and again. I watch my cock disappear into her body, watch her take me, watch her body yield and accept and grip me like she was made for this.
She pushes back to meet each thrust, taking me deeper, demanding more. Her palms scrape against rough wood, leaving marks on the logs. Her hips work in rhythm with mine. She's not passive, not just receiving. She's claiming this as much as I am, meeting my brutality with her own desperate need.
My hand tightens in her hair, controlling the angle, tilting her head back until her throat is exposed. I lean forward and bite down on her shoulder through the fabric of her shirt. Hard enough to leave a mark. Hard enough that she cries out and clenches around me like a vice.
"You feel that?" I growl against her shoulder. "Feel how deep I am inside you? That's mine now. This pussy is mine."
The possessive words make her moan. Make her push back harder. Make her body clench around me in ways that tell me she likes hearing it. Likes being claimed. Likes knowing she belongs to me now whether she admits it or not.
I release her hair to grip both hips, fingers digging into flesh hard enough to bruise. Marking her there too. Making sure tomorrow she feels me in every movement, sees the evidence of my hands on her body, remembers exactly who took her against this wall.
One hand slides around to find her clit, fingers working the swollen bud with rough precision. She cries out, body jerking at the sudden intensity, but I don't let up. I want her to come on my cock. Want to feel her fall apart because I make her, not because she does it herself.
"You don't come until I say." The command comes out harsh against her shoulder. "And you're going to come hard."
The combination of my cock driving deep and my fingers on her clit is intense. Her body gets wetter, hotter, tighter. Every thrust becomes easier and harder at the same time. Easier because she's soaked. Harder because my control is slipping with every desperate sound she makes.
"That's it." I bite out the words. "Take it. Take everything I give you."
She's close. I can tell from how her thighs tremble. How her breathing changes to desperate gasps. How her inner muscles start fluttering around my cock in a rhythm that tells me she's right on the edge.
"Come." I drive into her harder, faster, chasing her over the edge. "Come on my cock. Let me feel it."
She shatters with a cry that's almost a scream. Her whole body locks up, back arching, hips grinding back against me as orgasm tears through her. I feel every pulse, every clench, every wave as her pussy spasms around my cock in rhythmic contractions.
I grit my teeth and hold on. Make myself feel every second of her coming undone. Make myself memorize how she sounds when she breaks. How her body moves. How she gasps my name like a prayer or a curse or both.
Then I let go.
Release slams through me with brutal intensity.
I bury myself as deep as I can get and come inside her, filling her, marking her from the inside out.
My fingers dig into her hips hard enough to leave perfect imprints.
My teeth clench on her shoulder through fabric.
Every muscle in my body locks tight as pleasure obliterates thought and leaves only raw sensation.
Her body. Her heat. Her gasping breaths mixing with mine in the cabin's heated air. The knowledge that she's full of me now. That part of me is inside her. That I've claimed her in the most primitive way possible.
We stay like that for long moments. Connected. Breath coming hard. Both shaking from exertion and release and the stark reality of what just happened. I feel myself still pulsing inside her. Feel the mix of our release starting to leak out around my cock where we're joined.
Then I pull out slowly, watching my cock emerge slick and satisfied from her body. Watching more evidence of what we did drip down her thighs. The sight is obscenely satisfying in a way I don't want to examine too closely.
I step back. Give us both space to process without the distraction of skin on skin.
She stays facing the wall. Doesn't turn around immediately. I hear her adjusting her clothing with unsteady hands. Hear her breathing trying to steady. Hear the moment reality crashes back in and she has to confront what we just did.
I tuck myself away, refasten my jeans, and retreat to the window. Put distance between us before the possessive part of me decides distance is the enemy and tries to close it again.
"That was adrenaline." My voice comes out flat. Emotionless. Stating fact. "Survival instinct. Doesn't mean anything."
But even as I say it, she's already mine. Has been since the moment she grabbed my door handle and hauled herself into my world. This just made it official.
"Right." Her voice is small, shaken. "Doesn't mean anything."
She finally turns around. Her face is flushed. Her hair a mess where my fingers tangled in it. Her eyes bright with something that's not quite tears but close. She looks thoroughly claimed. Thoroughly mine.
And she's lying just as badly as I am.
The silence stretches between us, heavy with everything we're not saying. Outside, the storm rages on. Inside, awareness crackling in the space we're trying to maintain.
I turn back to the window, shoulders tense, jaw locked. Can't look at her right now. Can't trust what I'll do if I keep looking at her standing there flushed and claimed and pretending she doesn't want more.
"Get some sleep." The words come out harder than I intend. "Tomorrow we figure out how to keep you alive."
The pronoun hangs in the air. You, not us. Deliberate choice. Reminder that she's the one in danger, the one being hunted, the one who needs protecting.
I hear her move. Footsteps crossing to the bedroom. The door closing. Not slamming. Just closing with quiet finality.
I stay at the window, staring out at the storm. She's in there right now, probably telling herself that what happened meant nothing. Just adrenaline. Just survival instinct. Let her believe it for tonight.
Tomorrow we plan our next move. Figure out how to use that evidence without dying. But I'm already working on a different problem. Not how to keep her alive long enough to pass her off to the authorities.
How to make sure she never leaves.