She rolled her eyes as she tightened the saddle and tested it experimentally.
“Give it up, Sam.” She shook her head as she looked up at him. “I’m part of this team whether you like it or not.”
“Fine, be a part of it somewhere else then.” He held his horse’s bridle in a tight fist as she mounted her horse.
He felt equal parts lust and rage thundering through his system. She looked like a living flame perched on the back of that damned horse. A ready target for the psycho stalking him.
“I won’t ride out with you,” he said softly. He wouldn’t jeopardize her. He couldn’t.
She tilted her head as she stared down at him. Her green eyes were quizzical, her expression curious. “Do you doubt my abilities, Sam?”
Doubt her? He didn’t doubt in the least that she was the sweetest, softest thing he had ever touched in his life. That her heat, her passion, wasn’t the hardest thing in the world to resist. That he wouldn’t destroy her before it was over with. But he would be damned if he would lead her into the hands of a madman.
He didn’t answer her. He couldn’t answer her. He wanted to scream, to howl out in fury at the injustice of what he faced. He couldn’t do either. He glanced out the open stable door, remembering his need to smell freedom. It wasn’t worth the possible sacrifice. His stubborn determination had sentenced his brothers to hell; he wouldn’t allow the same thing to happen to Heather.
He shook his head wearily as he unsaddled his mount. Poor Rusty. He patted the roan’s rump. The stallion had been itching to run, just as Sam had.
“Sam?” Her soft voice questioned him.
“I won’t endanger you.” He tossed the saddle and blanket atop the saddle rail and led the horse back to its stall.
She sighed impatiently behind him. “Sam, you can’t go out alone. You know that. Did you forget what happened the last time you did that?”
His fists clenched as he locked the stall door.
“Yeah, Heather,” he bit out, turning to her slowly. “Something real fucking easy to forget…”
The scene surged through his mind, but it wasn’t Tate, it was Marcelle. Blood colored his vision as violence surged through his body for one hard, long second. He could feel his muscles tightening, his fists clenching as though to defend himself against the fury of a memory that never fully revealed itself.
“I’m sorry, Sam.” She dismounted, her face pale, her eyes wounded as she watched him. “I’ll find someone else to ride with you…”
He stopped her. Before he realized it he had gripped her arm, pulling her around until he had her pressed against the stall divider, her slender wrists shackled by his hands and stretched above her head. He stared down at her, breathing roughly, rage and desire burning through his body in equal measure.
“You don’t understand,” he growled roughly. “Listen to me, Heather. For God’s sake, for my sake, listen to me. Stay the fuck away from me. Please. I don’t want to hurt you, I don’t want to be the cause of your pain.”
She wiggled against him, her hips pressing closer, her stomach cushioning the hard-on raging behind the material of his jeans. He fought for his control, his muscles tensing, bunching as she watched him from those knowing, though innocent, eyes.
“How much longer are you going to wallow in self-pity, Sam?” she finally asked him, and the very gentleness of her voice was like acid on an already burning wound. “How much longer will you let him destroy your life?”
He stared down at her unblinking, fighting the overwhelming anger that made him want to hurt, to control.
“As long as it takes, Heather, for the smell of blood and semen mixing to get out of my fucking head,” he finally bit out. “Take that away, baby, and then we’ll talk about it.”
He threw himself away from her, knowing if he didn’t he might never be able to later. Her eyes were swimming with tears, her face pale with stress and pain as she watched him, and he couldn’t bear it. Couldn’t bear looking into her eyes, knowing she saw him for who he was, for what he was. Knowing that in one careless moment, in one passion dazed encounter, he could place her at the mercy of a madman once again.
He whipped his hat from his head as the fingers of his other hand pushed violently through his hair. There was nothing he hated worse than this feeling raising inside him. The burning anger and pain. The shame. It never failed to trigger the need to connect, to ease the aching emptiness inside his soul. The need to touch, taste and hear the screams of pleasure. But it wasn’t Marly’s or Sarah’s he needed to hear. It was Heather’s.
Chapter Sixteen
“Cade, he’s headed back in,” Heather spoke into her comm. link as Sam stalked back to the ranch house. It worried her, the intensity in his blue-gray eyes, the fury that tightened his body.
Anger was riding him hard and it was easy to see that the coming eruption could be more than any of them wanted to face. For all his joviality, the bleak dark core she glimpsed in his soul seemed all the more dangerous.
“Thanks, Heather. We’ll take care of him.” His voice was darkly brooding, anger and concern mixing in a haunting brew that tore at her heart. Three men, each scarred in different ways and fighting for survival. It terrified her, wondering if they would be able to fight their way clear of this one.
And it hurt her. She knew how such episodes ended. The blistering heat of the female cries as the August brothers joined in an orgy of sexual intensity with them. Though Sam didn’t seem to be taking part as often as he had in the past, she knew he had at least taken part in that damned limo. The danger surrounding them only increased the edge of lust that glittered in the men’s eyes on a constant basis.
They were highly sexed, and more than a little dominate. And though Sam seemed more playful than forceful, she could see the core of that dark sexuality becoming more apparent. The closer the danger came, the more that edge seemed to intensify.