Cassidy took several slow, careful steps forward, her heart rending. She wanted to run to him, put her arms around him, pull him to her, and comfort him. But something in her hesitated; something signaled she should proceed with care.
Her heart banged horribly, dreadfully.
Fred shifted his eyes to her, his head moving as he did so. Mac noticeably stiffened, his breath catching. The air became electric with awareness and tension. Releasing Fred, Mac shifted, not entirely turning. Fred took a few steps back.
She froze, holding her breath, eyes glued to him.
In a voice she didn’t recognize, he warned, “Go back, Cassidy.”
Knowing he wasn’t looking at her, she shook her head. She stared at him, her own eyes wide, noticing what she assumed was grease paint on his face. It was jarring and other-worldly; she was out of her element and unprepared as to what to do, but she wasnotgoing to walk away.
“You’ll only get hurt,” he ground out, his voice solemn, rougher, gravelly. “I’ll hurt you.”
“I’m not afraid of you, Mac.” That much was true. She believed with everything she had, he would not hurt her. “Tell me what to do.”
He swiveled more on the balls of his feet, looking up at her, his eyes eerie in the dark with the whites glowing out of the paint. “Go.”
Despite her words, a ripple of apprehension shot through her; anxiety and the familiar thrill she always experienced when she was the object of his attention, even in this bizarre situation. He’d warned her before. Jason had warned her. He wasn’t himself; he looked like a man barely hanging on to sanity, the fire and rage in his eyes battling with the last shred of reality as he tried to warn her. But the pain she saw there…
The pain was something she understood.
“No,” she breathed out. She couldn’t leave him alone with whatever was in his head. He wouldn’t leave her alone if their roles were reversed—hehadn’t. She dropped down to match his crouching stance. “I’m not leaving you, Mac.”
She wasn’t letting this one go.
His breath was still coming heavily, his chest heaving. She saw his eyes roaming over her and her brief attire; she saw how his body reacted to her—was aware of her response regardless of her concern. Mac made her weak, and his dark perusal made her feel… consumed.
And Lord, she wanted to be lost in him; absorbed by him. Her breath passed through her lips, her eyes fixed on him, trying to gauge his intentions.
He shifted and she, being as tense as she was, jerked in response, falling back on her arms with a small squeak of surprise. She was more frightened than she admitted to herself.
Then he was moving forward, crawling rapidly toward her, his moves lightning-fast.
With a strangled cry, she watched him as he came over her, covered her, even as she tried to scramble backward in the mud. But he was faster, and as she opened her mouth—to protest? To plead for mercy? To beg for him?—her mouth was claimed, her body crushed beneath him, pinning her to the wet earth. His fingers furiously and desperately pushed aside the crotch of her panties. Her legs fell apart to accommodate him. And then he buried himself in her, her scream of surprised pain muffled against his lips.
Cassidy lay stunned beneath him as his hips jerked fiercely, moving in and out of her at a furious pace, tears leaking from the sides of her eyes. Mac usually came with some pain, but this was double and not because of its speed or because she wasn’t ready for him; just a look from him, and she wanted him. But with each thrust, she absorbed his desperation, his sorrow,hispain, his need. And it broke her heart.
His mouth moved possessively over hers, bitingly. She allowed him this, too, to take what he needed; she wanted him to take, she wanted to give him what he needed. She slid her hands to his lower back, feeling the strength of muscles as his body met hers violently, the power behind his movements as he thrust so hard and deep they were sliding in the mud.
Maybe she shouldn’t have loved it as much as she did, but she did, holding on to him while he poured his pain into her, her tears still flowing.
His mouth left hers, biting along her jawline, then biting her neck; she shivered hard, gasping out and rising against him.
“Eres mía,” he rasped in her ear, sounding both possessive and broken at the same time. “Eres mía. Caminaría a través del fuego por ti.”
Cassidy had never heard him speak Spanish before, and she didn’t know what he was saying. She tucked her face against him, acknowledging this as the first truth between them; the surreal circumstances shattering their façades.
It made every move of his within her magic, and she wanted to give him more, to allow him to take comfort from her. The driving pace, the honesty of the moment, sped her to orgasm as she held him tightly, letting him drop her off the ends of the earth with another scream muffled against neck.
As though her cry gave him permission, he yelled out his own release, squeezing her painfully tight in his arms as his body convulsed into her, on top of her, before stilling. The sounds of the night soon won out over the sounds of their gasps and heartbeats.
Neither moved.
Mac’s face was pressed into her neck, and she rested her cheek against his head. She opened her eyes and stared up at the moonlit sky, her body throbbing with a heady mixture of pleasure and a dull pain.
He breathed deeply against her. He slid his hand from her waist, pushing her shirt up and exposing her breast, which he grasped, kneading. Her nipple responded, her vagina tightened, ready again as she drew in a shaky breath.
Finally, mournfully, “Day.”