Anew: Book Two: Hunted (8 page)

Amelia

I
can’t fathom Ian’s
mood. He seems genuinely unconcerned about any danger to himself whereas I’m
still shaking from his confrontation with Davos. What can I say to convince him
to take the threat to his own safety seriously?

Even if I could find the words, I doubt that anything that
would come out of my mouth right now would make much sense. Being with Ian
again, in his arms, the warmth of his body driving away the cold that has sunk
into my bones since we parted makes me feel as though I am flying apart. I’m
torn between joyful relief and the sharp pain of knowing that we will go our
separate ways when the ball is over and the evening ends.

How can we do otherwise? When we are together, he fears that
he will harm me and I know that I am harming him. I can’t bear to be the cause
of his suffering. Yet here we are…dancing. His right hand holds mine with
gentle firmness while the other rests possessively on my waist. My palm has
drifted a little from the broad sweep of his shoulder. I can feel the powerful
muscles of his upper arm even through the fabric of his evening jacket. Too
vividly I remember what he looks like in his natural state, his body perfectly formed
and honed, the ultimate expression of masculine beauty.

I close my eyes, swept by longing so intense that it robs me
of breath. When I open them again, Ian is staring down at me. His gaze is
darkened by concern.

“Are you all right? What’s wrong?”

It’s on the tip of my tongue to assure him that I’m fine
when I stop myself. Treacherous longing uncurls deep inside me. I have so
little time with him…

 “I’m still a little dizzy. I could use some fresh
air.”

My cheeks flame at the bold-faced lie. Apparently there’s
nothing I won’t stoop to in order to be alone with Ian. Just for a few minutes.
Where’s the harm in that? Hundreds of people surround us. More than a few of
their eyes are on us. With such diligent chaperones, we can’t possibly get into
any trouble. Can we?

“Let’s step outside,” Ian says. Holding my hand, he leads me
from the dance floor. I go with him gladly, only hoping that I can control my
unease near the reflecting pool. I’m fully aware that the problem I have with
standing bodies of water is directly related to the torturous years of
intermittent consciousness in the gestation chamber. But recognizing that and
being able to control it are two very different things.

When I realize that Ian is leading me onto a stone terrace
that extends from the opposite side of the Crystal Palace, out of sight of the
pool, I all but sag with relief. We are on the western edge of the park, facing
a broad swath of lawn studded with gnarled trees. Beyond it lies a low wall of
gray stone covered in lichen. On the far side of the wall is an avenue lined
with tall, stone-faced buildings, many dating from the previous century. They
are home to some of the cities wealthiest and most powerful.

The air is cool and slightly moist. Before I can stop him,
Ian takes off his jacket and lays it over my shoulders. I breathe in the scent
of the fabric that still holds the heat of his body. The sensation of comfort
and protectiveness is all but overwhelming but I don’t dare yield to it.

Instead, I say, “You don’t have to do that.”

“Do what?” he asks, his voice low and deep, close to my ear.

My hands clutch the lapels, holding onto them as though I am
holding onto him. I stare out at the twinkling lights that fill the trees. “You
don’t have to take care of me. We aren’t together anymore.”

I’m reminding myself more than him. The world in which I
find myself is too full of danger. I can’t afford to indulge in any fantasies
about the two of us.

He stiffens beside me. With surprise? Displeasure? I can’t
be sure which.

“Maybe I’m just being chivalrous.”

I turn, forcing myself to face him. “You feel responsible
for me but you shouldn’t. We both know that you never asked for me to be in
your life.”

He frowns as though he isn’t following me. “I didn’t know to
ask. I could never have imagined you. You were a gift, in every sense of the
word. The most amazing, remarkable, and--” His mouth quirks slightly.
“--challenging gift that I would never even have thought to dream of.”

His words and the warmth with which he speaks them bring a
sudden rush of tears to my eyes. I blink it back fiercely, struggling for
control. No matter how much I want to believe his version of us, we can’t deny
what my existence has done to him.

 “A gift?” I scoff. “One that’s forced you to relive
the past and confront demons you thought had been put to rest a long time ago.
Who would ever ask for that?”

He shrugs. “No one, probably. But knowing you, being with
you has made me realize that not dealing with the past doesn’t resolve
anything. Old sins just fester and become even more destructive.”

“They aren’t your sins.” At the very thought, anger rises in
me. “You were only fifteen years old. The guilt was your father’s, not yours.
He involved you in that terrible place.”

Ian is silent for a moment, gazing at me intently. Slowly,
he strokes the backs of his knuckles along my cheek. The pad of his thumb finds
and tugs lightly at my lower lip. At his touch, my whole body ignites. I can
barely suppress a moan.

His eyes darken. I have the sense that he is struggling
inwardly, weighing how much and what to say. Even so, his next words surprise
me.

“What about the pleasure, Amelia?” he asks softly. “Do you
imagine that wasn’t mine, as well?”

I stare at him, unsure what he is telling me. He was an
adolescent, in the throes of puberty. Of course, having sex would be physically
pleasurable but that doesn’t mean--

A faint, sad smile flicks across his face. “There were
aspects of it--the dominance, the possession, the control--that appealed to
me.” He turns serious, somber even, as though he wants to be sure that I
understand the full import of what he is revealing. “They still do.”

A tremor runs through me. My own nature isn’t remotely
submissive. On the contrary, it’s a good thing that I’m inclined to defiance or
I would never have survived. And yet, when I’m with Ian, something dark and
primal deep within me stirs to life. I become a being of pure sensuality,
craving his possession more even than light or air. Too easily I remember how
it felt to be beneath him, controlled by him, his cock thrusting into me,
driving us both to ecstatic release.

Ian is staring at my mouth. “Don’t do that,” he says.

“Do what?”

“Wet your lips.”

I didn’t realize I was doing so. I stop at once but it’s too
late. Heat flares in his eyes. Passion? Anger? I can’t tell. Starkly, as though
to discomfit me as much as I just have him, he says, “It reminds me of how good
it feels to be in your mouth.”

The muscles at my core clench. We’re in the midst of an
ultra-elegant event attended by hundreds of the city’s elite. But suddenly all
I can think of the wetness pooling between my thighs.

“We should go back inside.” My voice lacks even a hint of
conviction.

“We could do that,” Ian agrees. He takes my elbow but
instead of guiding me back into the Crystal Palace, we go in the opposite
direction, down a short flight of stone steps and out across the lawn. My heels
sink into the soft ground. Excitement flares in me as I wonder what he is
contemplating.

He slows his pace to accommodate mine but doesn’t halt until
we are twenty yards or more from the terrace, looking back at the ball. Light,
music, and laughter spill from the glittering pleasure dome. But it is
surrounded by deepening shadows and appears to be floating on a sea of
impenetrable darkness.

 “I used to come here when I was a kid,” Ian says
quietly. “There was an old restaurant at this location. Tavern on the Green, I
think it was called. It was torn down the winter I turned eight and the Crystal
Palace was built in its place. I found the whole process fascinating.”

My throat tightens as I think of the innocent child he was
before his father drew him into his own twisted nightmare and tried to make him
nothing more an extension of himself. A part of me is fiercely glad that Marcus
Slade ultimately drove his high-powered sports car off the side of a cliff. The
world is a better place by far without him.

We are standing beside an ancient, gnarled oak tree. Its
branches spread out above us, filled with new leaves unfurling from spring
buds. I breathe in the scents of the night and try to find solace in the simple
act of being close to Ian. It works, to a degree.

Even so, I start when he lifts my hand and lays it, palm
down, against the rough bark. Quietly, he says, “I carved my initials into this
tree. Right about…there. Feel them?”

Gradually, my fingertips find and trace the shape of an ‘I’
followed by an ‘S’. Two decades have passed since an eight year-old boy stood
here. The evidence of his presence has become blurred but I can still detect
it.

“Why did you do that?” I ask.

He hesitates, long enough for me to wonder if he’s going to
answer. Finally, he say, “That was the winter when I realized how bad things
really were between my parents.” His mouth tightens with old, remembered pain.
“My mother had bruises. I knew how she was getting them but I couldn’t do
anything about it.”

“Did you tell anyone?”

He shakes his head. “Even then I had a sense of how powerful
my father was. I knew that no one would take her side against him. When I tried
to talk to her, my mother insisted that everything was fine. I realize now that
she was doing what she thought she had to do in order to protect her children.”

“She loves you very much.” I haven’t spent a great deal of
time with Helene Slade but I have gotten to know her well enough to be certain
that she was and still is a devoted mother. One who did find the courage to
leave her abusive husband once she was certain that Ian had escaped him.

He nods. “She’s a wonderful woman but nothing could change
the fact that I felt completely helpless. That scared the shit out of me and
made me really angry. I started ditching school, roaming all over the city,
looking for something, anything that could help. In a weird way, watching a
building being torn down and something new going up in its place was a reminder
that nothing’s forever, things can be changed, made better.”

As the significance of what this place means to him settles
over me, I ask, “That’s why you carved your initials here?”

He shrugs. “I guess. I think that I wanted to leave some
evidence that even though I couldn’t do anything to help my mother, I was still
real. I existed.”

My throat clenches. I know all too well the pain that comes
from trying to affirm one’s existence to an uncaring universe. But at the same
time, I’m well aware that Ian is opening up to me in a way he has never done
before. First admitting to desires he has fought to deny and then revealing how
vulnerable he has felt.

I could weep for the child he was but it’s to the man that I
turn. My fingers, coming away from the tree, twine around his. I rest my other
hand on his chest and lift myself on tiptoe. Softly, I touch my mouth to his,
giving him time to draw back should he so choose.

When he doesn’t, I’m emboldened. If there’s any chance that
he’s right about it being better not to let the past fester… Like the spring
leaves, hope unfurls in me, small and tentative but present all the same.

“I’m not afraid of you, Ian. You have never done anything to
harm me, and I don’t believe that you ever could.”

The muscles in his throat ripple. I draw closer, pressing my
body against his, needing desperately to give him everything--passion, yes, but
also warmth, comfort, and above all, acceptance. Or perhaps what I truly need
to share with him is love, that mysterious, elusive emotion that I’m not even
sure I’m capable of experiencing.

“You have too much faith in me,” he says. “You need to be
free, Amelia. After all the years that were taken from you before you were
allowed to awaken, I can’t bear the thought of denying you the opportunity to
live to the fullest.”

Passion flares behind his eyes. His hand cups the back of my
head. “But at the same time, I want to keep you only for myself, to possess you
completely. I want to be in your every breath, your every thought. I really do
want to own you in a way that has nothing to do with any paperwork.”

His lips brush mine, once, again, savoring, parting, taking.
His tongue thrusts deeply. The spiral of need and pleasure spins upward, wilder
by every moment, out of control. My fingers dig into his broad shoulders, my
body pliant under his hands.

The taste of him intoxicates me. I want more. My hunger for
him is ravenous. He is light, air, hope, promise. He is everything.

I cling to him, my arms wrapped around his waist, my hands
savoring the feel of hard, toned muscles just beneath his shirt. He backs me
against the trunk of the tree, reaches out to grasp my wrists, and stretches my
arms over my head. His big, hard body holds me in place.