Untamed Vol. 1 (Untamed #1) (4 page)

CHAPTER
SIX

 
“You live in a cave?”

He nodded and sat
on the edge of the bed, the mattress sagging from his weight. “Tourists used to
come here, but the cave was closed after a few rock slides,” he said, his eyes
bright. “I made my home here.”

I looked through
the doorway, wondering what else lay beyond. “How is it that nobody’s found you?
Surely the park rangers would have looked in here.”

A smile tugged at
the corners of his mouth. “It’s hidden behind a gap in the walls. You can’t see
the entrance, you can only feel it.”

I took another
sip of tea, thoughts bouncing around in my head. Alaric swung his legs onto the
mattress and settled in beside me, his large frame taking up nearly the entire
twin-size bed. He took the mug from my hands and set it on a rock ledge on his
side, then urged me down. “Go back to sleep,” he said, his arm draped across my
chest.

I rolled to my
side and faced him, my muscles wound tight.

“I make you
nervous,” he said, brushing hair away from my face.

I stifled a
snicker. Well wasn’t that the understatement of the century? “No, no you
don’t,” I lied.

He brushed the back
of his fingers against my temple, looking at me with unbearable tenderness.
“Don’t be afraid…” He paused. “What’s your name?”

“Chloe.”

“I’d never hurt
you, Chloe,” he said, my name sounding so foreign on his tongue.

I averted my eyes
to keep from falling further into the warm depths of his gaze because, despite logic
and reason, I
wanted
to believe him.

His fingers
continued to sweep through my hair and eventually, my muscles began to relax,
my heart rate slowing. And no matter how hard I tried to stay awake and remain
vigilant, my vision eventually dimmed until the shadows on the walls bled onto
Alaric’s face.

And then everything
was awash in black.

~

From a faraway
place I felt a tug, then the slide of fabric against my skin, the cool air a
welcome respite for my overheating body. Even after I surfaced to
consciousness, I kept my eyes shut and reveled in the delicious slide of warm
hands on my thighs, spreading me wide open.

When I couldn’t
take it anymore, I opened my eyes and found Alaric kneeling between my legs,
one hand wrapped around his engorged shaft as he stared down at my wet heat.

His eyes flicked
upward and, realizing he’d been caught, flashed a wry grin.

“What are you
doing?” I asked.

He huffed through
his nose, his gaze once again drawn to my throbbing core. “It doesn’t look like
I imagined.”

I stretched my
arms over my head and arched my back, a smile playing along my lips. “What did
you think it would look like?”

His nostrils
flared, his eyes fixed down. “I thought it would be hairy.”

I bit my lips
together to keep from laughing. “Some people like to have it waxed.”

“And I thought it
would be… bigger.”

“Bigger?”

He glanced down
at the hard length in his palm. “To fit.”

I opened my legs
further, still drunk on sleep and desire. “It adjusts to accommodate your
size.”

His dark eyes
fixed on mine as he nodded. “It’s so tight and so good it’s almost too much. Like
I might die and go to heaven.”

I chuckled—I
couldn’t help it—but the laughter died in my throat when he asked, “What
do you taste like?”

I blinked up at
Alaric, at a loss for what to say. I’d never really enjoyed receiving oral sex,
had always felt too self-conscious to enjoy the act. Needless to say, I’d
never, in all my twenty-seven years of existence, tasted myself.

Before I could
respond, Alaric reached out and drew two fingers down my slit, spreading my wetness
around as he explored my folds. He dipped two fingers inside me,
then
brought them up to his lips. I held my breath as he
sucked his fingers into his mouth and let out a rumbling groan that I felt deep
in my gut.

He leaned over
and did it again, maintaining eye contact while delving deep into my heat. A
moment later, he brought his fingers up to my lips. His gaze unnerved me, made
me feel laid open and vulnerable, drove me to push past my discomfort.

Finally, my
tongue darted out and I tasted myself for the first time. It was a strange
flavor, like nothing I’d ever tasted before, but it wasn’t altogether unpleasant.
His nostrils flared when I opened up and sucked on his fingers. Then he was on
me, his mouth ravaging mine, hands roaming over my heated skin. Just as
quickly, he pulled away and flipped me onto my stomach.

I looked over my
shoulder, finding him gazing down at my backside with naked wonder. But he held
back, even as every muscle in his body strained against his skin. He wet his
lips and said, “I want inside you.”

I nodded,
understanding what he needed. I set my head on the pillow and lifted my hips,
opening myself up like I’d never done before. The old me would have had a heart
attack at the idea of doing something so indecent and crude, but this woman,
trapped in a cave with a wild man, heartily approved. She even swayed her hips to
further entice.

My back arched
when Alaric thrust into me in one powerful motion, a gasp escaping my lips. He
filled me, stretched me,
reached
me in a place I
didn’t know even existed.

He let out a
breath when I squeezed around him, his fingers digging into my hips. “Do that
again,” he said on a breath.

I did as he
asked, continuing to pulse around him, even after he withdrew and slammed back
in. It took two strokes before I was coming, liquid pleasure rushing through my
veins and turning my limbs to jelly.

Alaric flattened
his body against mine, pressing me down into the mattress. He rocked into me
relentlessly, brushing my hair aside and pressing kisses all over my shoulders.
He was taking and giving, dominating and supplicating all at once.

I knew he was
close when his movements became jerky and his hold on my arms tightened. With
his face pressed to my back, he clamped his teeth on my skin, gently biting
down on my shoulder as he continued driving into me through his climax.

I loved it
all—the slight sting from his teeth, the hard length pulsing inside me, the
heady feeling of abandoning everything that made sense in my life. Here, in
this moment, I was reborn.

After he had
recovered, he nipped along my shoulder and up to my earlobe. “It’s like you
were made to fit around me,” he said, his beard tickling the shell of my ear.
He rolled off me and immediately tugged me into his chest.

I turned my head
and grabbed his hair, bringing our lips together. “Or maybe
you
were made to fit
me
?” I said with a smile. I reached
between my legs for his semi-erect shaft and drew it back inside me.

He let out a
rumbly, satisfied groan and wrapped his arms tighter around my chest. “I’m
going to keep you, Chloe.”

I stilled and
held my breath, wondering if this was the time he’d let on his real intentions,
when I was too exhausted and trapped to fight back. “Oh? What would you do to
me?” I asked through the lump in my throat.

He gave my neck a
gentle bite. “I would make love to you all day, every day. Find out all the
ways to make you come and do that over and over.” He nuzzled me with his nose
and breathed me in. “I would figure out what makes you happy.”

I let out a
ragged breath, tears stinging my eyes. I snuggled into his chest, feeling his
cock swelling back to life, and tried to get a hold of my tangled emotions.

~

A fiercely
beautiful face crowded my vision when I opened my eyes some time later. I let
out a sigh while I watched Alaric sleeping, the surly lines between his
eyebrows smooth for the time being.

I took the
opportunity to study him in this unguarded state. I ran my gaze along the sharp
ridge of his nose to his lips and down the strong column of his neck. Before I
could help it, my gaze traveled down his muscled torso and even lower still,
past his belly button.

I sucked in a
breath when I saw the thick, hard length lying heavy against his leg. My core
clenched, reminded of how it felt to have him inside me, stretching me, driving
in and out. I bit my lip, using all of my willpower to keep from reaching out
and wrapping my fingers around him.

I slid out of bed
instead, taking one of the blankets and wrapping it around my shoulders. The
floor was warm on my bare feet and was surprisingly dirt-free, as if someone had
spent considerable time sweeping until only the stone surface remained.

I tiptoed out of
the room and emerged into an area three times the size of the bedroom. On one
side was a brown couch facing a large white bookcase overflowing with books. I
couldn’t even fathom how he could have moved those things in here without being
seen. Surely someone would have caught him stealing a bookcase?

It was then I
remembered that everything in this cave—the bed, the mug,
everything
—had been stolen. Alaric,
for all his unrefined charisma, was still a criminal being hunted down for
breaking and entering, theft, and murder.

I turned in place
in search of a way out when my eyes came across a deep, rectangular niche carved
into the side of the cave about chest-height. I should have been looking for
the exit, but curiosity got the best of me and I crept closer to see what the
hole contained.

Inside were
various tools—sets of screwdrivers, a hammer, chisels—you’d find in
any old garage. I walked along the wall as I inspected everything and came upon
a flat slab of rock about waist-height. I froze, my stomach dropping to my
feet.

On the stone
table lay a machete covered in dry blood.

CHAPTER
SEVEN

I sensed Alaric’s
presence before I heard him.

“There you are,”
he said in a sleep-roughened voice.

I spun around and
accidentally rammed into the corner of the stone slab. I doubled over as pain
bloomed over my hip.

Alaric ran to my
side, brushing hair away from my face and peering at me in concern. “Show me,”
he said.

“I’m fine,” I
said, trying to edge away, wrapping the blanket tighter around my shoulder. I
needed to get away from him, to escape this cave before I too ended up in the
morgue. I took a gamble. “I think it could use some ice,” I said in my most
pained voice.

He gave a short
nod and disappeared down a dark hallway.
 

My heart raced. I
didn’t think he’d actually have a refrigerator in this place!

I spun around,
searching again for the elusive gap in the wall. I ran around the perimeter of
the room, finding only solid rock. I ended up at a darkened corner, sliding my
palms along the wall, jittery and desperate to find that blasted gap.

“What are you
doing?”

I spun around,
instinctively flattening my back against the wall. “I was trying to find a
bathroom,” I said in a shaky voice.

He approached me
with a large rock in his hands, his face hidden in shadows.
 

This is it. This is how I’m going to die.

I shook my head, silencing
the whimpering voice. No matter what, I wasn’t going down without a fight. So I
let him approach me, let him lift the blanket away while a flimsy plan formed
in my head. I jumped when the rock’s smooth, frigid surface touched my skin.

“Oh my God, it’s
cold as ice,” I said, the reason for my trembling now twofold.

His dark brown
eyes watched me. “There’s a section of the cave that is always cold. That’s
where I keep my food.”

“Can I hold it?”
I held out my palm and he placed the rock on it. “Does it look like it’s
helped?” I asked, looking down at my hip.

When he crouched
down to look, I lifted my arm and swung the rock down on the side of his head.
He crumpled to the ground.

I dropped the
blanket and ran out of the room, tumbling headlong into the shadowy halls. I
turned into the first archway I encountered and quickly backtracked when I
realized I’d ended up in the bedroom. I ran around in a near panic until I
found myself faced with yet another solid wall, another dead end. I took in big
gulps of air, starting to feel the terror rising up from my stomach.

Suddenly I was
grabbed around the waist and jerked back into a body as hard and unforgiving as
the walls. “Why?” he demanded, his voice edged with anger.

I struggled and
screamed, my legs and arms flailing. I tried to hit him with the rock but my blows
seemed to have no effect on him.

He held one arm
tight around my middle and the other wrapped around my arms and waited. After
long minutes I sagged in his arms, completely sapped of energy.

“Why?” he gritted
through this teeth. His hold was like a vice, never easing up.

I shook my head
as tears leaked out my eyes. I kept my lips shut, not trusting myself to speak.

“Are you trying
to run away?” he asked, a question and a plea.

“I don’t want to
die,” I said as a sob bubbled up from my throat.

He stiffened and
all of a sudden his arms fell away, releasing me. “What?” He took hold of my
shoulders and turned me to him, his face cloudy with confusion.

“I know what you
are. I know what you did to those campers,” I said, refusing to meet his eyes.

His forehead wrinkled
as he folded his arms across his chest. “What?”

“You killed them
then stole their belongings.”

His features
smoothed as understanding dawned on him. But he didn’t deny the accusation. He
only blinked at me with an impassive expression on his face.

“I wanted to be
wrong about you,” I said, backing away until my back hit the uneven wall. I
reached behind me, still hoping to find that elusive gap.

Long minutes
passed. He stared at me while I tried to find my way out, but it was a
fruitless endeavor. I was trapped.

Finally, he broke
the silence. “You think I’m a killer?” he asked, taking an angry step closer.

I held up the
rock, reminded of the first night we met and how utterly out of my depth I had
been even then. “I know you are. I saw the machete caked in blood.”

He held out his hands,
palms up. “You think my hands are capable of murdering a human being?” He
reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind my ears. “You think I would hurt
you?”

My lips quivered as
it took everything in me to look into his eyes. “I know what blood looks like
and that was definitely blood on your knife.”

“You’re right,”
he said. “It
was
blood.”

I sucked in a
breath.

“Elk blood.” The
anger slid off his face as he nodded at me. “I hunt to eat.”

Still, my chest
was tight, disbelief tangling with hope.

“Do you really
think I would kill anyone?” he asked gruffly.

“I don’t know.” I
shook my head as the severity of the past few days came down on me. “I don’t
even know you.”

He ran a gentle thumb
along my lower lip. “Then stay,” he said in a soft, raspy voice. “And get to
know me.”

“Stay with you?
Here?”

“Yes.”

I pulled away, my
heart thundering. I swallowed. “Show me the way out first. Please,” I said. “If
you want me to stay, you first need to give me the option of leaving.”

His nose flared
but then he gave a short nod. He took hold of my hand and led me back down the
hall towards the main room where I’d first started my search. He picked up the
blanket from the floor and dusted it off before laying it over my shoulders.

Then he led the
way directly to the solid-looking wall behind the bookcase and disappeared into
it. Only when he pulled me along did I realize that the walls overlapped, with
a sizeable gap in between.

We emerged into an
immense cavern, the size of which took my breath away. The ceiling was over a
hundred feet high with impressive stalactite formations reaching down.
Stalagmites rose up from the ground over twelve feet high, and gave the room a
jagged, otherworldly appearance.

“I’ve never seen
anything like it,” I said and looked up to find Alaric smiling at me. “It’s
like being on another planet.”

He grinned and
tugged on my hand, leading me through the uneven terrain. We walked in silence
for a time, where only my heavy breathing and the steady drip of water could be
heard.

“This is the only
way out?” I asked.

“This is the way
I take,” he said and all of a sudden, we were outside. He led me out onto a
large plateau high above the red and yellow tinted forest still partially
veiled in darkness. He held a finger out to a point in the distance. “There. Your
cabin is that way.”

I took a few
steps towards the edge, squinting, but all I could make out in the early dawn
were trees rolling up and down the mountains. “How far?”

“About five
miles.”

I twisted around
to look at him. “You carried me for five miles? In the dark?”

One corner of his
mouth lifted. “I did.”

“Did
Morcillo
see you leaving the cabin?”

He shook his head
then winced.

“I’m sorry about
your head.”

He reached up and
rubbed his scalp. “It will heal.”

I turned back to
the mountains, my emotions still at war. I could feel him looming behind me,
could feel the wall of heat his immense body was emanating. I turned around to
face him. “I came here to the mountains to run away from my life. I wanted to
be someone else for a week, someone spontaneous, adventurous,” I said. “Then I
met you.”

He blinked down
at me, waiting.

“I don’t know who
you are or what you’re doing here by yourself. I’m not even entirely sure
you’re not the serial killer the police are talking about.”

His jaw hardened
and his eyebrows drew together.

“To tell you the
truth,” I whispered, “I don’t know what to believe anymore.”

He slid a hand around
behind my neck and pulled me closer, resting his forehead on mine. “You can go
if you still think that about me,” he said, his eyes burning into mine. “I
won’t keep you here against your will.”

I closed my eyes
and breathed in the same air, focusing on what I knew for sure—the tender
way he held me in his arms, the warmth of his eyes when he looked at me, the uninhibited
honesty in his words. Despite what everyone else thought, deep down I knew
firsthand that inside this wild man was a gentle soul.

With my heart in
my throat, I said, “I’ll stay. For the next five days I’m yours.”

He was impassive
for a few seconds and then, slowly, a smile lit up his face and crinkled the
skin around his eyes. He grabbed hold of my face and kissed me, rough and
needy, a promise of things to come.

“Mine,” he said,
his breath whispering across my lips.

He turned me back
to face the forest and, with his arms wound around my waist, we watched the sky
change colors as the sun began its daily rise. And there, enfolded in the warm
circle of Alaric’s arms, I greeted the new day.
 

~

Uncovered
, part two in the series, will
be released in November 2014.

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