Taming Alaska (So Not Prince Charming Book 1) (20 page)

“Yes.” I wiggle my butt into his groin to feel the length of his engorged desire—all for me. A needy urge soaks my panties. I will remember last night for the rest of my life. I hope it lasts longer than the next few days. I cuddle closer to Shane for reassurance.

His arms pull me tighter into his chest and his strong embrace. “Is this just sex?” He has the deepest, sexiest voice I’ve ever heard. “It’s okay if it is. I just want to know.”

I never really thought of Shane this way. Every girl knows he’s sex on a Secretariat-like rod, but I never thought about us being a couple. My body has just always begged to be with him.

“No,” I say, rotating in his arms to face him. My index finger twirls in the trail of hair leading to that wonderful tool of pleasure. “I grew up on Disney princesses. I suspect I’m like most women and expected those cartoons to be real, but they’re not. I had no idea I wanted—no needed a man strong enough to be there for me—a man like you. My mom really liked you and wanted me to be with you.”

“She has good taste.” If it’s even possible, his cock grows larger, the length of him rubbing the sensitive area between my thighs. My body trembles with anticipation of him probing deep inside me.

“That night I first met you, she told me I could date you. That you were mature enough.”

“She said that?” It warms my heart to hear she thought that. “Why didn’t you?”

“She didn’t want me to have sex with you, and I told her I wasn’t that much of a saint. She told me that she hoped you would marry a man like me someday.”

“She told me that too.” Mom gave her blessing to Shane.

“I have feelings for you Cyn, and I don’t know what to do with them. My life is pretty fucked up right now.”

“Mine isn’t in better shape.” My hand slides down the length of his cock. It twitches under my caress. “What were you going to do with all that money you made?”

He kisses me, long and slow, and it intensifies deep into my sex and stiffens my nipples.

“Would you have stayed in Austin and started another company?” I ask.

“No. I had my eye on a fishing camp on the Kenai. It needs a lot of work, but the land on the river is pure gold.”

I never really knew this about him. “Why hasn’t someone already bought it?”

“The old woman who owns it won’t sell to developers. She wants it to go to someone who was born in Alaska and will preserve the place like her husband and she did.”

While I play with his hard cock, it pokes my stomach. He closes his eyes and groans.

“I don’t think I could spend the winters here. It’s only fall, and I’m miserable from the cold, and aren’t the nights really long?” They already seem too long to me.

“They are. I could spend my winters in Austin.” He’s compromising.

I lick and suck on his sinfully sensual lips. “What about the Virgin Islands?” If we’re going to dream, dream big. “Like running a Tiki bar in the winter?”

He scratches his thick beard. It’s sexy on him, though I like his face clean-shaven too. “We are both so far away from that now.”

My face crinkles at him being serious and realistic. “I know. Maybe it’ll make the next few days better if we have something to look forward to.”

His rough hand grazes my cheek and brushes away the hair in my eyes. “I owe the IRS over 200 million. If they can’t collect, I’ll be looking at prison.”

The way he touches me is so sensual I’m having a hard time holding onto a thought. “But all your money was stolen.”

He laughs. “The feds don’t care.” His lips descend onto mine, and I’m his. “Why don’t you let me make love to you or fuck you until you scream?”

* * *

Fully satisfied, I don’t mind the rain. We hike toward the Yukon River, and it’s only a day or two out. I don’t know what we’ll find there, but anxiety chips away at my raw nerves, even though I completely trust Shane.

He can hike across this wilderness without ever stopping or tiring. The never-ending camping trip has worn me down. I don’t know how I’ve kept going, but I don’t want to whine and I don’t want to die.

Every muscle in my body aches, especially the one Secretariat exercised. Even though I hurt, a smile plays on my lips. My very first orgasm. He knows how to pleasure a woman. I have wasted so much time on the wrong men.

I trudge up the rocky incline. Shane’s feet are sure, while mine stumble along. I should’ve broken my neck by now, but by pure luck, I haven’t. He helps me along the way, but his pack weighs at least a million pounds while mine is probably fifteen or so.

We haven’t gotten very far before I hear a painful whine echoing in the woods through the tall fir trees. The rain has turned to snow, and it wets my cheeks, but I remain fairly dry from his pants and my shell. I’ve never seen snow, and it comes down in fat clumps. It’s not pretty but cold and wet and chills the air even more, if that’s even possible.

The cry burrows under my skin, so I scoot closer to him. “Shane, what is that?”

He grimaces. “An animal caught in a trap.”

My face pinches with anguish. Though the wolves have tracked and attacked us, I wouldn’t want any of them to suffer.

“We should move away from here,” Shane says in that sexy, deep voice of his while he unholsters his handgun.

I step toward the noise despite Shane wrenching my arm to leave. I have to see. Inside the shadows of the trees, a steel trap cuts into a silver fox’s paw. The black wolf gnaws at the fox’s mangled, trapped paw. Is it trying to free the fox? I swallow the sobs clogging my throat.

Blood stains the fresh layer of snow. The black wolf and its mate lower their heads, growling at us. The female paces back and forth while the other wolf takes a tentative step toward us.

“Unless you want me to kill them, back away slowly,” Shane says.

I tread backward, faltering. If it weren’t for Shane holding me upright, I would’ve fallen on my butt and the wolves would’ve pounced on me.

My body shakes with fatigue and cold. I don’t think I can step another foot. Shane pulls me from the carnage. He forces me to plod away from the site while he walks backward to keep an eye on the wolves.

When we’re a quarter mile away, he stops to feed me water and one of my energy bars. As I sob, my mouth chews on the rich chocolate. That poor fox was suffering.

He folds me into the crook of his arms, holding me to his chest. “It’s okay, Cyn.”

“Why couldn’t you free the fox?” I mumble, choking on tears.

“I legally can’t. McKenna will be by to take the animal.” He studies me, sympathy written on his face. “You’ve hit the wall.”

“What?” I didn’t run into any walls, not that I know of, but I’m so spent my body doesn’t want to cooperate.

“You’re exhausted. We can’t rest here long. We have to get over the ridge and out of range of Loki and Red.”

My mind is so muddled I cannot even think straight. The high from sex has drained from my body, and I only want to curl up and sleep or die. I don’t care anymore. “You should leave me here. I ruined your vacation.”

“It’s a lot more interesting than it was.” He kisses my forehead and holds me in his arms. “You’ve done great so far, better than most men. We’re going to make it out of here alive, but I need you to keep going for another three hours then we’ll rest.”

I don’t think I can move another inch so more tears choke me. As I get to my feet, a bulky man, older than Shane, steps from the trees, carrying shorn fox and wolf skins over both shoulders, some sort of dead animal sits on his head. His shiny black hair sticks out at odd angles from the hat. He’s carrying the silver fox that the wolves were trying to release, and it makes me want to throw up.

The stench of not bathing for weeks wafts off him and about knocks me over. I spit out my energy bar, my stomach swirling but staying put for the moment. I wonder why Shane doesn’t smell. He hasn’t bathed.

“Your girlfriend doesn’t look so hot,” the man says, scratching his scruffy beard.

I hope he doesn’t have lice.

If they’re going to chat, I may as well nap. I plop down on the ground.

“You don’t happen to have your short-wave radio on you?” Shane asks McKenna.

McKenna digs in his ear for who knows what. “No. Never carry it on me.”

Shane explains our situation to the man he calls McKenna. He nods a few times then finally says, “I wish this was anyone but your brother, Shane. Loki, he’s a no good son of a bitch, but Red, he’s a good man. I know he’s hit a few bumps in the road, but I’d hate to take him down.”

McKenna and Shane help me to my feet.

“You can’t let that stop you, Little Bunny,” McKenna says, stinking of whiskey and wild. “If Red beats you to the gorge, you’re as good as dead.”

Do I look like a bunny or a princess? I snarl at him. “Tell me something I don’t know.” And what will Shane do when he faces his brother?

I finally manage to plug along by myself while gathering my second wind. I don’t know what happened to me. I felt fine and then my energy was ripped from me.

McKenna hikes with us because he’s on his way to Tonakwa. While he speaks with Shane, Shane consistently checks on me, only half paying attention to McKenna.

I don’t know how, but I mange to hike another eight miles until Shane calls it quits. My feet feel like they’re about to fall off. I may even be too tired for sex. Snow blankets the ground and from where Shane sets the tent, I can see the river cutting between the mountains.

“We can’t hike over the mountain?” They’re snow covered, and the clouds play peek-a-boo with the peaks.

“No,” McKenna says. “They’ve gotten a ton of snow and it’ll be deep, not to mention avalanches.”

“Don’t they happen in the spring?” I ask, though I’m no expert. It must’ve been on the Discovery Channel.

McKenna tugs out a flask and takes a healthy swig. “You’re in Alaska, Bunny.” He offers me a nip, but I shake my head.

The thought of my lips anywhere near his makes me want to gag.

Shane sets up the tent far away from McKenna and upwind from him. He fluffs up the sleeping bag and tucks me into the sack, and it makes me think of how he’d treat his child, gentle and caring.

His chapped lips and beard nuzzle my cheek, and despite the grazing of my skin, they comfort me. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to stay up and talk to McKenna. You should sleep.”

I couldn’t keep my eyes open if I wanted to. His hands pull me up to his chest and into his lap where he sits cross-legged on the ground. Though I’m fairly tall, I feel little in his arms.

“Thank you, Shane.”

“Goodnight, Princess.” For once, no sarcasm scrapes across my nickname. “I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else but here with you.”

“I’d like to be on the beach with you.”

He smiles, kisses my forehead before leaving me in the tent. Through the flap, I see him sit across from McKenna where they share brandy from Shane’s flask. I wish Shane wouldn’t do that.

Exhaustion coils around me and pulls me under, but before I go out, I overhear McKenna say, “What are you going to do with Red? He could be tracking you right now. It’s not like you can sneak up on him, and he could take you both out from a mile away given all that training.”

“I know,” Shane says, his voice tense. “I know.”

My whole body shudders—a mile away? How far is he from us now?

Chapter Eighteen

Shane

I take another swallow from my flask of brandy, and it pools in my gut, warm but churning. The closer we get to the gorge where we’ll probably meet Loki and Red, the more anxiety I feel. McKenna quietly sips from his. As the fire shoots embers skyward, the heat warms my legs, and the birch fills my nose.

“I don’t understand why,” I say. “Why would Red risk prison? He’s already spent time in jail, and he said he’d never go back.”

McKenna skins the fox he removed from his trap, which he shouldn’t do so close to our camp. “You know he has a kid that has some disease or something.”

“What?” Ever since I started my company six years ago, I’ve only been back a few times to hunt the bear, and I haven’t spent much time with my family.

“Red found out about him like a year ago after the mom died. Her mother was taking care of him, but she doesn’t have much, so she told Red. He loves his little boy. I guess he needs the money.”

I pull on my hair. “Fuck.” Now what do I do? I can’t help him financially, and Red’s an accessory to murder. “I don’t know what I’ll do. He’s my brother, but I won’t turn Cyn over to them.”

“I thought you were marrying some other girl, and she was coming up here. That’s what your sister said.”

“Yeah. Once I lost my money, she dumped me.”

McKenna chews on caribou jerky while he removes the fox’s internals. “How did that happen?”

“Move the entrails away from the camp.” He should know better.

“I will,” he says, even though the blood soaking into the ground will attract predators. “So, how did it happen?”

I let out a sigh. “My financial advisor told me to put my money in foreign accounts, and then it disappeared. It was wired all over to God knows where. Someone stole my identity, all my bank accounts, passwords, everything.” When I return to Austin, I have a huge mess to cleanup.

More blood hits the ground. “Was it your accountant?”

This is why I’ll have to let go of Cyn. I can’t hold onto her if I have to serve any time. “I don’t think so, but I don’t know. I’m fairly sure it was someone I know, so I have a host of suspects.”

I tear into one of Cyn’s energy bars. I’ll need more than this to tackle Red, so I take out a bag of prepackaged food and heat it up. “Why haven’t you ever settled down, McKenna?”

Sadness flickers in his eyes. “I almost did once. She wanted me to move to California. Damn if I would. As soon as she found a man who would move her south, she left. Not too many women can handle the wilds of Alaska. You know what I’m talking about.”

I dig into the beef stroganoff. “I do. I doubt Cyn would last up here, though she’s hiked over sixty miles.” I don’t know what do about her.

“I didn’t think a skinny girl like her could last out here that long, but she has a ways to go, and you have to get past Red and Loki.” He glances back at my tent. “She’s cute and spunky though.”