Pursued (19 page)

The memory of the black shadow-man had long since been banished to the vault—an uneasy corpse, to be sure, but at least it was no longer loose in her psyche, walking and talking and ready to wake her screaming with nightmares. Elise had it under control—for now.

What she didn’t have under control was herself. And that scared her—scared her almost to death. Because the feelings of sexual want and desire weren’t natural for her. The deep, maddening yearning in her soul to be touched, to be stroked and tasted, to lose control in another’s arms, was wholly foreign—wholly
wrong.

I don’t do those things. I’m not that way,
whispered a voice in her head—the high, trembling voice of a much younger girl. Of a victim.
I don’t
want
to be that way. I can’t. I
won’t
.

She knew Merrick had some idea that things were wrong and going wronger by the moment, but still Elise struggled to control and contain her embarrassing problem. After all, she couldn’t tell him she was terminally
horny.
Even though her pussy was constantly wet and her nipples ached with need, it wasn’t something she was prepared to admit to herself—let alone him.

Still, she saw his nostrils flare sometimes when they were close to each other and wondered if he had other ways of sensing her problem. If he could tell how difficult her life was becoming, how the
hunger
and its new companion,
lust
, were tearing her apart inside even as she strove to keep a calm outer façade…

* * * * *

The night before they were supposed to make orbit around Rageron, Merrick decided he couldn’t take it anymore.

He’d been patient and calm and kind and the Goddess knew none of those qualities came easily to him. But he couldn’t sit by and watch Elise die because she was too frightened and proud to take what she needed from him.

He could feel the
hunger
coming off her in waves. Their bond might be fake but it worked just fine for conveying her needs and emotions to him. Holding hands with her every night wasn’t enough to feed the immense need he felt growing inside her. It was like throwing a starving man a few crumbs of food every day and expecting him to survive—it wasn’t going to happen.

But there was something else growing as well. Along with the
hunger
in her he also felt…desire. Even outright lust. Which complicated things a hell of a lot. He remembered what Sylvan had said—that as time went on Elise would need deeper and more intense touching and that things might have to turn sexual between them. The thought made his cock hard and the mating fist at its base swell with desire…until he remembered the stark fear in her eyes the night he’d come into the room and frightened her half to death. Her body might be in heat but her mind most certainly was
not
and that led to a whole new set of problems—problems he couldn’t ignore if he wanted to keep her alive.

He didn’t want to hurt her, didn’t want to frighten her or scar her anymore than she’d already been scarred. But he didn’t want to watch her die, either. And the hollows around her lovely brown eyes told him she was headed downhill. Something had to be done and fast—but what?

At last meal—rehydrated food cubes which they shared, eating across from each other at the tiny fold-out table in the living area—Merrick held an inner debate with himself. He was trying to decide how to work things out, how to give Elise what she needed without making her hate him.

Obviously what needed to happen was for both of them to get naked in the bed and just touch—skin to skin, flank to flank, chest to chest—probably for the entire night. That
might
be enough to get her through without turning sexual—although how the hell he could hold her naked in his arms and not show any signs of how much he wanted her was beyond Merrick.

And of course there was the problem of getting Elise to agree to try this in the first place. He was fairly sure she was still frightened of him—a holdover from her flashback. So he could hardly strip her naked and hold her down. Even if every instinct inside him didn’t rebel against the idea, he still wouldn’t have done it. He didn’t want her to hate him. But what if it was a choice between that and watching her die? What if—

“You seem to be thinking awfully hard about something over there.” Elise stirred her
Grieza
worms—a delicacy from Twin Moons—with her fork as she spoke. She’d been reluctant to try them at first but after a single bite, she’d showed a pretty good appetite. There were only a few worms left on her plate but the troubled look in her eyes said she wouldn’t be eating them. “Are you thinking about Rageron?” she asked him. “Do you have family there?”

“No to the first question and yes to the second.” Merrick sighed. “You want to know the truth, I’m thinking about
you
.”

“Me?” Elise’s eyebrows raised and he heard the instant defensiveness in her voice. Great, he was definitely in for a battle. “Why would you be thinking about
me
?”

“Because you’re starving to death,” Merrick said bluntly, tired of beating around the bush. Fuck small talk—they needed to get this out in the open.

She pushed her plate away. “But I’m so full I can’t eat another bite. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“The hell you don’t.” He glared at her. “I can feel it.
Here.”
He pounded himself on the chest with his fist. “We’re connected by the bond, remember? And I don’t care if it’s fake—it still works the same way. I know what you need and you’re not getting it.” He leaned closer to her, holding her eyes with his. “You’re not getting it because you’re not
taking
it.”

“I…we…” Her hand fluttered to her chest. “We hold hands every night—just like you said Sylvan told you to do.”

“He said to touch you at night to make the days easier, not that we should only hold hands,” Merrick pointed out. “That was my idea, after that one night when you had your
nightmare.”

She lifted her chin but didn’t address the emphasis he’d put on the word. “It seems to be working fine though. I don’t really see the problem.”

Finally Merrick lost all patience. “The problem is you’re
fucking dying!”
he roared, pounding the table hard enough to make their dishes rattle. “And I’m not going to let you sit by and commit suicide because you’re too scared to take what you need!”

“What do you know about what I need?” Elise shouted back, surprising him. “What the
hell
do you know about anything?”

Merrick narrowed his eyes. “I know a hell of a lot more than you’d like, sweetheart. I know that the
hunger
has changed. It’s more intense now…more sexual.”

Elise’s face went white as a sheet. “You…how would you know that?”

“I can smell it on you.” Merrick inhaled deeply, illustrating his point. “How hot you are, how much you need to come…” He sighed and ran a hand over his face. “Look, there’s no shame in it, baby. Sylvan said this might happen. That you might need—”

“I don’t need anything like…like that.” Elise’s voice was high and brittle. “I don’t…I’m not like that. Not that kind of girl.”

“It has nothing to do with what kind of female you are.” Merrick tried to keep the exasperation out of his voice. “It’s about feeding the
hunger
before it starves you to death.”

“But I’m fine…
fine,”
Elise insisted.

“You’ll take me down with you if you go. You know that, right?” He looked down at his own half finished dinner. “The way the bond is placed, if one of us dies, we both die.”

“I…oh.” Elise suddenly seemed to shrink in on herself. “I guess…guess I forgot about that. I’m so sorry, Merrick,” she whispered.

He felt his heart contract. At least she still cared a little. “I figured you might’ve,” he said roughly. “And I’m sorry I shouted at you. I’ve just been…really fucking worried these last few days.”

Elise bit her lip. “I…I have too,” she admitted at last. “These feelings…they’re frightening because they’re unusual. I don’t normally…I never feel this way.”

Merrick looked at her in disbelief. “What, you’ve never been horny?”

She shook her head, a bit primly he thought. “No, of course not. I’m always too busy worrying about work or James or…I don’t know. Anything but
that
, I guess.”

Merrick shook his head. “When you told me you and that idiot fiancé of yours didn’t have sex, I could believe that. But are you honestly telling me you never touch yourself either?”

“James and I are waiting because James respects my wishes,” she said. “And no, I never, er, touch myself. I don’t need to.”

You might need to tonight,
he thought but didn’t say it aloud. It was obvious that the idea of sex—even self-sex—made Elise intensely uncomfortable and defensive. Better to keep things low key and non-threatening if he could.

“All right,” he said at last. “Leaving all that out of it, the fact is I need to touch you.”

“I know,” she said in a small voice. And the sudden fear blooming behind her eyes was enough to make his heart twist.

“That’s going to be a problem, isn’t it?” he asked, his throat tight. “Like it was the other night? The night you got so upset?” He wasn’t going to mention her “nightmare” again if he could help it.

She nodded, a quick, terse jerk of her head. “It might be.”

Merrick frowned. “Then how can we do this? How can I touch you without freaking you out again? How can—” He snapped his fingers as an idea came to him. “I’ve got it!” He looked at her plate where she was still toying with the last few worms. “You finished?”

She nodded. “Yes. Why?”

“Come with me.” Merrick held out a hand to her and watched as she struggled to take it. It hurt his heart to see the indecision in her eyes—the longing warring with fear. Finally, she slipped her small, cool fingers through his and nodded.

“All right. Let’s go.”

* * * * *

Merrick led her into the bedroom they’d been sharing the entire flight and went to one of the storage cupboards on the wall. “Here.”

Elise looked down at the slender metal hoops he’d handed to her. Her heart was still trying to pound its way out of her chest as she wondered what he had in mind. “What are these?” she asked blankly.

“Shock cuffs.”

“What?” She frowned at him. He was standing in the middle of the room undressing in a way that made her nervous and hot at the same time. God, he had the most amazingly muscular chest she’d ever seen. She remembered being pressed against it—against him—and wished she could do that again without fear. Without the bad memories in the vault coming out to play. She never felt this way when she saw James with his shirt off…but maybe now wasn’t the best time to think of her fiancé.

“Shock cuffs,” he repeated patiently, breaking her train of thought.

“Okay…” The words meant nothing to her.

“They’re top of the line.” He toed off his boots and tossed them in the corner along with his discarded t-shirt. “They don’t cause any lasting damage but when you put them on someone they deliver a hell of a jolt if they try to get loose.” He flashed her a grin. “Good way to keep somebody in place, you know?”

“What?” Elise felt all the blood drain from her face as she considered the slender silver rings in a whole new light. “But that’s horrible! Why do you even have these?”

He shrugged, his massive bare shoulders rolling with the gesture. “I do a bit of bounty hunting from time to time along with scavenging and smuggling. They tend to come in handy.”

“And you…you want to put them on
me?”
Elise shook her head and began backing away from him. “No, Merrick. No, absolutely not. I can’t… I won’t…”

“Hey, whoa…hold on.” He was in the act of unbuckling his belt but he stopped and came toward her, hands held out entreatingly. “Those aren’t for you, baby—they’re for
me.”

“What?” Elise was almost as appalled as when she’d thought the cuffs were meant for her. “You want me to chain you down and shock you?”

“I want you to feel
safe.”
Merrick sighed and ran a hand over his skull-cut hair. “Look, it just came to me a minute ago—I’ve been thinking about this all wrong. I kept thinking I had to touch you in order to keep you healthy, to feed the hunger. But then it occurred to me.”

“
What
occurred to you?” Elise asked impatiently.

“That
you
could touch
me
instead. Think about it, Elise—you need skin-to-skin contact with me, that’s all. But it doesn’t have to be
me
making the contact, not if it makes you uncomfortable. Not if it brings back bad memories…or nightmares.”

Finally what he was saying began to sink in.
I
could touch
him
. Of course, why didn’t I think of that?
But she knew the answer to that one—it was because she’d been trying so hard not to think of him that way. Trying not to think of anything even remotely sexual.

“I…I don’t know,” she murmured, biting her lip. “How…how exactly would we do it? Uh,
this…
how would we do
this?”
she corrected hastily.

“Simple. I’ll strip and lay on the bed. You cuff my hands behind my back and then get undressed yourself. Then touch me as much as you want. Until you feel completely satisfied.” He raised his eyebrows at her. “Got it?”

Sudden pictures filled her head, images of her touching him
everywhere,
doing things she shouldn’t, being a bad girl, a
naughty
girl… Her hands itched to stroke every inch of his hard, muscular body and her pussy had never felt so wet and hot, but her mind was frozen by fear.

“Elise?” he said, making her name a question.

“I…” She licked her lips with a tongue that felt like sandpaper. “I understand what you’re suggesting but I…I’m not sure…”

“It doesn’t have to be sexual, baby,” he murmured. Ducking his head, he caught her eyes and held her gaze with his own. “Not if you don’t want it to be. It can just be about touching. About taking what you want—what you need—without being afraid that I’ll touch back. Because I won’t be able to—not with those on.” He nodded at the cuffs in her hand and gave her a small smile. “What do you say?”