They do not kiss, as is their usual custom. She gets into the back of the car. Her eyes keep going back to his frame – solid and muscled and coiled with tension, like a cougar about to spring. His vivid blue eyes scorch her as the driver whisks her away.
James sits up front. He turns to regard her.
“Please pack just enough to see you through. We shouldn’t stay for more than ten minutes.”
She agrees.
They drive up to her apartment. She lives on the fifth floor of a family building. Very nice neighborhood. The trees here cast an umbrella shade. A jogging lady on the sidewalk is accompanied by a little terrier running as fast as it can on its little legs.
“We’ll come up with you,” James says.
She does not protest.
Her doorman greets her with a “Good morning, Ms. Chalmers.”
“Good morning, Pat.”
He eyes James and her bodyguards suspiciously.
“They’re with me,” she quickly says.
Pat says, “Haven’t seen you for a couple of days, Ms. Chalmers.”
“I'll be going away again, Pat.” Outwardly, she appears calm, but her pulse is throbbing painfully.
“Be seeing you soon then.” He smiles and doffs his cap. The uneasy look has not left his eyes.
“Yes. See you soon.”
She takes the elevator up to the fifth floor. With the three burly mercenaries with her, she feels safe.
The doors slide open with a ping. They walk out. Her apartment is the third one on the right. Her heart is strumming up a staccato beat. Why does she feel so nervous? As she slides her key in her lock and opens her door, a strange sensation prickles her back.
She breathes in deeply. The door moans open. She doesn’t know what she expects to see. Her apartment thrashed, perhaps. Her furniture broken and burned.
I’m being irrational, she scolds herself. Why would Hugh want anything to do with my apartment?
Her lounge is intact, the way she left it Friday morning. She breathes out a sigh of relief.
“Stay here,” she tells James. “I won’t be long.”
She moves swiftly to her bedroom and flings open the closets. No one has been here. Her passport is in a drawer under her hanging clothes. She retrieves it as well as a small suitcase. She throws it on her neatly made bed and begins to select some choice items. In between, she quickly sheds her much soiled dress and puts on a halter top and a pair of comfortable jeans.
She hears sounds outside. Channing’s voice! Her heart leaps.
“Go down to the car and wait for us,” he says to James as he strides into the bedroom. “We need to leave right now.”
He pauses as soon as he sees her. His blue eyes are extremely stunning in his strong face. His short hair is like a felt cap on his well-shaped skull. He is not wearing the clothes he had on when she left him.
“OK.” Her pulse races. “What happened?”
“They spotted Hugh. He’s coming for us.”
The way he says this sends a chill down her spine.
He slams down the top of her suitcase. She has hardly packed more than fifteen items. She grabs her purse with her passport in it and runs after him.
He makes to vault out of the door, but she says, “Wait. I need to lock up.”
He waits for her impatiently as she inserts the key in her lock. James and the others have already gone down in the elevator. Her palms are clammy. She doesn’t think she will see this apartment again for a long, long time. But she will be with Channing, and that is what’s important.
“Come, let’s go,” he says, taking her arm.
They take the elevator downstairs. A parked car sits at the curb in front of her apartment building – a green Audi A7.
Pat doffs his cap again. “Be seeing you soon, Ms. Chalmers?”
“Not likely, Pat. Bye.” She infuses her voice with a cheer she does not feel as she tries to match Channing’s stride towards the revolving doors.
“Where are James and the others?” she asks Channing.
“They’ve gone ahead.”
Channing wrenches the Audi’s passenger door open in a hurry.
“Quick,” he says.
All this urgency is making her stomach flutter. She throws herself in as he flings her suitcase into the booth. Then he gets in, starts the car, and they are off with a roar of the engine.
He drives like a speed demon, weaving the car in and out of traffic. She thinks they will get stopped by the police at this rate.
“How long to the airfield?” she asks.
“Forty minutes. We’ll take a short cut.”
They drive out of the city. Channing’s handsome face is terse as he navigates the vehicle smoothly onto the freeway. They delve into a turn, which then leads – through a series of narrowing streets – into a lonely woodland road. She is reminded of the first time Channing drove her to his house. His beautiful home, now burned to its foundations.
After about ten miles, he abruptly slams on the brakes. She jerks forward, saved by the seatbelt.
“What’s happening?” she says.
He pivots to her and seizes her face. Her stomach flips as he kisses her full and lush on the lips. All her senses scream with the new sensory overload. She’s too much in shock to mount a response.
His lips meld onto hers, devouring her mouth. His tongue insistently probes between her lips. She eagerly lets him in. His hands are all over her – grabbing her breasts, her waist, diving down to the mound of her pussy beneath her jeans. His tongue licks and explores the insides of her mouth sexily.
Oh, what a kiss! She doesn’t dare breathe throughout it all. What does this mean? That they have ascended yet another rung on the ladder of their strange relationship?
How she hopes!
Oh Channing, Channing, I love you. Please, please love me too.
His voice is husky as he says against her mouth, “I need you now, baby. Let’s go to the backseat.”
Her mind is still reeling from the shock. “But what about the airfield? What about Hugh?”
“It’ll be a quick fuck. I just need you so badly right now.”
He grabs her hand and puts it on the enormous bulge tenting his pants. Yes, he clearly needs her rightaway. She’s frazzled by the whole thing – the kiss, the suddenness (and inappropriateness, considering their situation) of his desire for her. But she wants him badly too. She doesn’t dare pass his blatant display of libido up for fear of putting a kink in this new level of their relationship.
Besides, she is still bound to do anything he desires, whenever he wants it.
They move to the backseat and leave both passenger doors open. He pounces on her and rips off her top, revealing her breasts in her brassiere. She’s bowled over by his passion. He tears down the zipper of her jeans and shucks them off her legs, pressing her body down against the fabric seat.
Wow, she thinks. He has never been so hard for her before.
He still has his clothes on as he pulls off her panties. He parts her legs and quickly fumbles at the buttons of his pants. He wears no underwear. His cock is ready and rock hard as he rams it into her pussy, still not fully wet. She gives a cry of pain.
He begins rocking his hips against her immediately. His body is hard and oh-so-muscled above hers, and her own lust for him starts to climb. They both grunt in concert with each jab of his penis. Her hands claw at his shirt. He has too many clothes on and she needs to see more of his delicious skin. So in her passion, she rips the front of his shirt open – just the top three buttons.
And sees something she has never seen before on his right pectoral, just above his nipple.
A tattoo of a rose.
Desert rose.
In shock, she realizes who he is.
He clamps his hand across her mouth before she can scream.
“That’s right,” Hugh Crawford says, still pumping into her, “I have you now, and I’m going to make my beloved brother regret the day he was ever born together with me.”