Branded Sanctuary (4 page)

“I honestly can‟t believe you‟re on the other side of this phone, sounding so teacherly. Not wearing a stitch. It‟s really turning me on.” His laugh made her grin, an expression so out of practice, instinctive or deliberate, it was a real surprise to feel it stretching her face. “Focus,” he repeated, even more sternly. “You‟re already a problem student.”

“That‟s what my teachers said. I just learned faster than everyone else and got bored.”

“Sounds like a challenge to me.
Lucille,
by Kenny Rogers.”

“Oh my God, I love that song. I dated a guy who was a roadie for him on his nostalgia tour a few years back. There was this seventy-year-old woman up front and, no kidding, she threw her panties at him.”

“Your roadie or Kenny Rogers?”

“Kenny Rogers, jerk. But Stan had to retrieve the panties so nobody slipped on them. He was a sweetheart. He made a point to get them back to her after the concert.

Told her that, while Kenny appreciated the gesture, he thought some lucky guy probably couldn‟t wait to see her in those crotchless purple mesh panties.”

“You made that up.”

“Truth is always stranger than fiction. Are you really going to make me sing
Lucille
?”

“I‟d never make you do anything.”

“But you‟ll think I‟m a chicken.”

“
Le petit poulet.
Already do, remember?”

“Will you say something else in French? Or Italian? Can you do an Aussie accent?”

“You give me a song, love, I‟ll do anything you want.”

A shiver ran up her spine at the broad tone that brought to mind Heath Ledger.

“All right, here goes. But you really do have a masochistic bent.”

“That‟s sadistic, love. A masochist craves pain. A sadist gives it. Though that‟s a brush with too broad a stroke, to my way of thinking. Start singing, pretty sheila.”

“I have an Australian friend who says that word‟s old-fashioned now.” Chloe rolled over on her back, guiding her fingers through her headboard and holding there as she stared at her ceiling. “I wish it wasn‟t. Don‟t talk that way anymore, though. I like your voice, just as it is.”

“Anything you want,” he said softly. “Will you sing for me, Chloe?” Closing her eyes, she hummed a few bars, taking a moment to collect her thoughts before starting the first stanza. A man seeing a woman in a smoky bar, thinking he was going to get lucky, never realizing he‟d stepped into a tragedy of love lost.

When she was done, Brendan was quiet. “I like
your
voice,” he said. “Nice and off tune, pretty and feminine. I can‟t believe you knew every word. You sang it like you felt it, no self-consciousness at all. You‟d be great in my class.” The sincere compliment was a small thing, but it was an accomplishment. Giving her a feeling she hadn‟t had in awhile—that she had something worthwhile to offer. She wanted to push away the morbid thought, and the emotions that crowded in behind it, but the refrain of the song haunted her mind.
Why did you leave me?

“Brendan, would you do something for me?”

“Anything.”

“Are you really still naked?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Good. Can you put your hand on your heart?”

A space of time, then: “It‟s there now.”

“Can you count out the beats? There‟s this theory, that when two people focus on the rhythm of their hearts, it synchronizes them. Brings the beats together.”

“One beat. Two beats. Three beats… Is your hand on your heart too?”

“Yes,” she answered, closing her eyes. She whispered the cadence, and though hers leaped when she realized it was working, it settled back down, slowly aligning with his verbal count. She began to speak aloud with him, in unison. “One beat, two beats…

He was with her. It felt like that thump against her hand was the true beat of his heart. Relaxing her head against the pillow again, she let her other hand drift down between her legs, finding the matching pulse there, holding her hand cupped over her still moist sex. The need to sleep that had been waiting behind the door of her nightmares was rising, a warm, relentless force, pulling her into its embrace.

“I‟m getting sleepy, Brendan. But I don‟t want to go.”

“Sleep, Chloe. I‟m here. We can play later.”

“Good,” she murmured. “I can think of some really terrible girly songs for you to sing.
Like a Virgin, Girls Just Wanna Have
Fun…
”

“Now who‟s the sadist? Sleep, sweet girl. Just sleep.”

“
Hero,
by Enrique Iglesias. Sing that to me. Do you know the song, the words?”

“I know it. Close your eyes. I‟m curled up behind you, holding you. Nothing will bother you any more tonight. I‟m here.”

“Don‟t forget the sappy whispered part at the beginning.” He hummed a few bars first, just as she‟d done. When he made the soft plea to be her hero in that sexy whisper, he did it perfectly, not silly or awkward at all. She bet he was the best drama teacher ever. He began the ballad, taking her toward dreams, a slow spiral, no darkness. As candlelight guided her way, the shadows were a comforting cloak from reality, rather than its deceptive camouflage.

Believing he would keep her safe, she slept.

Chloe rubbed at her eyes blearily and checked again to be sure she had her embroidered Tinkerbell knapsack, the bag she carried as a purse. Yep, still on her shoulder. Same place as when she‟d checked two minutes ago. She hoped her license was in there. She‟d mislaid her keys twice in her stumbling morning departure ritual.

She was already running late for Tampa traffic. Technically Marguerite and Gen had opening responsibility today, but the pre-work crowd could be demanding. She liked to be there to help. Plus, once she‟d awakened again at 6 a.m., a scant ninety minutes after she‟d hung up with Brendan, she hadn‟t been able to get back to sleep.

Stepping out the door, she pulled it closed and gave St. Frances a fingers-to-the-glass kiss. The cat, sitting in his side window shelf seat, gave her an indifferent look, which normally would have made her smile. Suppressing a sigh, she turned, and found herself confronted by something far more reassuring and unsettling at once.

Brendan, in her driveway, leaning against the door of a silver Jeep. Mortification warred with the indefinable, though she wanted it to be pleasure.

He looked…well, there was nothing a girl could do but stop and take a long, thorough look. Which required the indulgence of other senses because of course they were like jealous siblings. If the eyes got a look, the lips wanted a taste, and then the nose wanted a deep, long drag of that nice male musk. At the wedding, it‟d been threaded with the fragrance of the lavender sprig in his tux lapel. She‟d been bathing in lavender lately, and the idea of it, a bath with lavender and Brendan spicing the waters… How could anything be better than that?

Those direct hazel eyes met hers, a gray-green-brown color she imagined would grace Fae wings to help the creatures blend into the forest. Silken black brows and straight-out-of-a-teen-heartthrob-magazine hair. It had the casually styled multi-layered look, and his jaw was clean-shaven. At the wedding, Gen had remarked, albeit in a low tone, that his hygiene and fashion confidence were stereotyped gay male, icing on a solid, dense cake of hetero sexual preference. The best of both worlds.

Maybe he was Italian. A pretty Italian momma‟s boy without the momma‟s boy part.

She was babbling in her own head. Not a good sign. As he straightened from the Jeep, walked toward her with a loose-limbed stride, the relaxed athlete, she had to remind herself to breathe. He stopped at the bottom of the stairs, looking up at her.

Months ago, she would have blithely skipped down the steps, wrapped her arms and legs around him and given him an enthusiastic kiss. She was painfully aware of that. She also would have had a hundred things to say by now, but the images of last night crowded in, the uncertainty of where that left them today, and she couldn‟t think.

He braced a booted foot on the bottom step. She liked the combination, scuffed black cowboy boots underneath his stressed jeans. When he‟d been at the Jeep, she‟d tried not to obviously linger on the nice presentation of his groin as he‟d leaned against the door, ankles crossed, one hand hooked in the jeans‟ pocket. The casual blazer and button-down shirt complimented the outfit, screaming sexy college professor. All his female students probably had wet dreams about him. Hell, she was feeling that response now.

“How did you know where I lived?”

“I have friends in law enforcement who owe me favors. You were worth calling one in.”

Before she could untangle her tongue at that, he withdrew his left arm from behind his back. In his hand was a stuffed puppy, a Rottweiler with a floppy red felt tongue and a blue bow tied around his neck. The laugh snorted out of her like a Jack-in-the-box surprise that made her jump a little, startled at her own noise.

“Thought you could use a guard dog.”

“The bow kind of ruins the ferocious reputation, don‟t you think?”

“He says he‟s as capable of being cuddly as he is of ripping someone‟s throat out.” Something a little dangerous went through his gaze, making that aroused response intensify. The tingle reminded her of a satellite photo she‟d seen of a star cluster, one solid ball of heat in her stomach, light flashes radiating out from it into the other parts of her body.

His gaze remained on her face, making her suspect he was studying the shadows under her makeup free eyes, the lines around her mouth. “I don‟t know what to say,” she ventured.

“Then don‟t say anything.” Sliding an arm around her waist, leaving the puppy between them, he drew her down to him. Her arms automatically threaded over his shoulders, and when he brought her close, she pressed her face into his neck and all that silky hair.

Oh he was a dream come true, for sure. She should know better. But a part of her still wanted to be the Chloe she was months ago, who wouldn‟t question good fortune, who would embrace it wholeheartedly. She hadn‟t marked time. Instead, when something ran its course, she anticipated the next stroke of luck, beauty or happiness, rather than grieving on what had changed or passed.

But this Chloe saw all the shadows, the dark corridors and remembered her fear of a thumping branch in the middle of the night. The sly, malicious voice in her head told her this wasn‟t real, that she was merely using this temporary shelter to hide from those things.

Then Brendan turned his head toward hers, brushed his mouth over her lips. Not a sweet brush, but a sensual, lingering drag that came back to center and steadied as the comforting arms tightened, one hand palming the back of her head. Instead of pity, he gave her heat, a simmering, slow curl-the-toes-up-in-the-shoes heat, teasing her mouth open, tangling with her tongue so everything from chin to knees went tight, tingling, fluttery or wobbly.

The bag slipped off her shoulder as she slid her own hands up under his arms, inside the jacket, and dug her fingers into his back through the thin stuff of his shirt. She was acutely aware of the body under the clothes. How could she not be? He‟d lain naked in his bed last night, gripped his cock and followed her direction to climax, leaving her vibrating, taking her to wonderful dreams.

Okay, instead of being flighty Chloe, staying home to hug trees and balance her chakra flow, she could be raging hormone Chloe, staying home to fuck the daylights out of the most irresistible thing that had ever shown up on her doorstep.

No, she couldn‟t. Because here it came, the pleasure turning to desperation, a simultaneous need to pull him closer and shove him away. She‟d never been a needy, clingy kind of girl. She wouldn‟t become that. She wouldn‟t do that to herself or Brendan.

As if he knew, though, he‟d already eased up, lifted his head to give her a sexy half-smile. “I hadn‟t planned that, but after last night, I couldn‟t get this close and not taste you. Feel you.”

“Okay,” she said.

His smile became a grin. “Can I give you a ride to work? And a ride home tonight?” He drew her down the steps and to the Jeep, where he leaned back against it, bringing her close again.

“I‟m a little out of your way.”

She wasn‟t sure where he lived, but she was pretty sure that he lived in town. He‟d told her that during their conversations at the wedding, which had been light and easy as two butterflies playing and chasing one another over a moonlit meadow, occasionally stopping to sip nectar from flowers. Or, in their case, champagne.

“You‟re as out of my way as a fork in the road, and just as intriguing.” He was still holding her close, but Chloe realized she was pressed against him as though she was using his ability to stand in lieu of her own. Every curve fitted into the shapes and planes of his body, so his chest was against her breasts, his groin against her belly, for he‟d shifted his legs apart to cradle her in between. Long thighs stretched out on either side of her, his hands gripped low on her hips.

His aftershave was mixed with faint chlorine pool smell. When she slid her fingers through his hair, he tilted obligingly, eyes locked on her face. It was like passing her fingers through flowing water. She dropped her touch to his side, then his thigh, following it to his fingers at her hip. They flexed beneath her touch. His cock had gotten hard from her proximity, the increased pressure of it against her belly, but he didn‟t seem concerned about acting on that. He simply let her keep moving her hands over him. That increased pressure brought a sharp need of her own, though, one that had sharp teeth and the threat of darkness.