The Heart of War (51 page)

It was tattered and faded from the sun to nearly lavender, but she thought that at one time it could have been purple. Alena felt her heart fall as she reached up for the corner flying in the wind; she gave it a good yank but nothing happened. Wrapping the cloth around her wrist and forearm, she pulled again. Some of it came loose but part of it was stuck between the rocks. Whatever it was, it wasn’t a towel or part of a lifejacket or even a shirt. One last hearty yank and the rest of the material popped out, showing her what had been obstructing its path; a large knot.

Fump-fump-fump

Ero--

“What have you got, woman?”

Startled by Ares’ booming voice just behind her, Alena turned around, bobbled and almost fell off the rocks to the sand. He offered no hand to steady her before she found her footing and clutched the blanket to her. “What is this?”

“Why would I know?”

“It’s your goddamn island, remember? Where did it come from?” Alena shook the blanket at Ares.

His headache came on full bore as his nostrils began flaring. “I said, I don’t know,” Ares challenged and snatched the blanket out of her hands, ripping off a few of her fingernails in the process. “It’s just a bit of old cloth.” Angrily he cast it to the beach. “I told you to go inside.”

“I told you to go to hell,” Alena lobbed. “You know what this is? It’s the blanket from my dream. How did I get here?” she asked through gritted teeth.

“I thought you told me you were shipwrecked. Were you lying to me?”

The tone of his voice and his stance were meant to be intimidating, and they were, but that didn’t mean she was going to back down from him. “How are Sister Augustine and Father Murphy? Well, I trust.” He said nothing, he only stood there with his jaw set tight and his neck muscles straining. Alena started to shake as she leaned in still standing on the rocks until she was almost eye to eye with him. “What have you done? You and your
Son
. Tell me damn you! What have you done?”

SMACK!

The sound echoed down the beach, off the rocks and back to Ares’ ears as he watched Alena fall from her perch to the sand.

It all went so fast, he wasn’t quite sure what happened. One moment she was standing there berating him, the next she was freefalling to the sand while the back of his hand was stinging. Then his mouth was running with no help from him. “Who the hell are
you
to question
me, Celt
? I said get inside! DO IT!” The hand still gripping the axe, it swung just past Alena’s head as he raised it and pointed up to the cave.

Here Alena made what would have been an utterly fatal mistake for nearly anyone else. “What the fuck is wrong with you!” Scrambling to her feet, hand to her cheek, she started running away with fearsome anger growing deep in her heart.

Dark eyes burning fire leered after her as Ares followed with the axe slung over his shoulder.

4

Dashing through the entrance to the cave, Alena ran straight to her room and locked the door. She stood there with her heart racing and tears rolling down her stinging cheek as she struggled to get her breathing under control. Feeling as though she were going to be sick, she put her hand over her mouth just as she heard his heavy footfalls coming down the dirt corridor. Sharp shallow breath caught in her chest as she closed her stormy eyes, wishing he would just pass by. For a moment it seemed she would get that lucky and his footsteps walked by the door but then luck changed as he turned around. The doorknob turned, she heard him snort in disgust just before he materialized inside the room.

“You didn’t really think that was going to work, did you?” Ares looked over his shoulder to sneer at the locked door.

“Well, I had hoped…” Her voice trailed off as she stared at him. His eyes were as cold and distant as they were burning fire. For a second she wondered if he even saw her or knew where he was. “I’m sorry; I didn’t mean to upset you all right? I’m sorry.”

That didn’t sound like the smartest thing to do but neither did going against him. “What’s wrong with you?” Alena whispered as tears choked her voice. “What have I done? What is this?”

“I told you I have a headache. Now come over here and relieve it.”

He had a headache all right, two of them from the looks of that bulge in his leather pants. With her hand pressed to her quivering mouth and feeling sicker than ever, she shook her head slightly and barely whispered, “Please, you’re scaring me.”

Ares inhaled deeply through his nose as he closed his eyes, savoring the scent and letting it linger. The corners of his mouth turned upward, “I know,” he whispered coldly. When those eyes opened they gazed upon her with lustful icy stare. “The odor wafts from you like the scent of a bitch in heat. That’s not all I smell, is it?” That thousand-yard stare dropped below her waist as he licked his bottom lip.

“There are other women here, you don’t need me for this.”

Ares let out a long breath as he shook his raven head and then sucked in air over his teeth. “I see you want to do this the hard way.” He shrugged his brawny shoulders and gave a fake smile. “Ok.” Dropping the axe, swooping her up with one arm Ares flung her onto the bed like a ragdoll. Alena let out a cry of indignant surprise as she hit the mattress. “Get rid of the dress.” When she didn’t hop to obey him, but instead just stayed in place staring up at him with disbelieving eyes he spoke again. “Do you want me to do it for you?”

“No.” She could not win this fight. Even if he wasn’t a God, even if he couldn’t command fire, he still outweighed her by two hundred and fifty pounds—mostly muscle. He could rip her to pieces with his bare hands and not think twice about it. She could put up a good fight but in the end, he’d win.

“That’s right, I will, so don’t defy me.”

“You can read my mind?”

“No,” Ares chimed darkly as his hand reached out gingerly tracing the outline of cheek. “All I need to know about you I can read right here, in your eyes. Be a good girl and do what I tell you.”

The last time she took her clothes off for him, he’d made her feel beautiful, and there had been music, dancing, and much love between them. They made love until the sun came up giving each other the most exquisite pleasure time and again. It was a night she would cherish forever. Now he made her feel ugly and dirty. She was fearful and ashamed as the chemise slipped over her head. She could argue, she could fight, in the process be beaten to a bloody pulp and possibly lose the baby. Alena would do anything to keep the baby safe. If she could keep his temper down and just do what he wanted then maybe everything would be all right. “What can I do for you, my Lord?” Long fingertips reached out to skip through the hair on his chest hoping after this, when the sun rose again, Ares would be himself. Still ornery and cool as a cucumber but the passionate, tender Warrior she fell in love with.

“That’s better,” Ares complimented as he ran his thumb over her quivering bottom lip. “Much better. Good girl.” With his free hand, he stripped the leather pants from his sweaty body and stood naked before her. “Now let’s see your best. Show me all the things Adrian and the others have taught you.” Ares grabbed Alena by the back of the head and brought her forward to his throbbing cock.

“Whatever you want my Lord.”

“That’s right, whatever
I
want,” Ares whispered. “So contrite now, little Fey, what happened to your fire?”

No kisses. No cuddles. No warm embrace. Alena knelt on the mattress while Ares stood in front of her and her lips over his swollen member. Alena’s warm wet tongue lapped along the shaft, around the head and down to the base, and back again. She tried not to cry while Ares’ hands entwined in her hair, bringing her closer to him, forcing her take more of him inside and down her slender throat. The more of the hard pulsing cock that he pushed down her throat, the more she gagged and tried to swallow, tried to draw shallow breaths through her nose and not let her retching stomach have its way.

She tried not to think of what she was doing and the desolate way it made her feel or the way it made her heart ache and her stomach heave. Two nights ago she welcomed this very act with lustful gusto, but now she’d do anything to run and be far away in some soft safe place. As she’d once done with Adrian, Jaakim, and others, Alena focused not on the hot pulsing cock in her mouth but on the green hills of her homeland. She tried to think of the way the sun came up over the moors making the mist rise. The fresh smell of the green pines as the light morning breeze blew across her face. Soon her mind was detached and completely numb to her precarious situation even as her mouth suckled the hard shaft her tongue danced around.

Before she knew it, the burgeoning cock in her mouth started pulsing as the hands in her hair gripped the sides of her head, but at the last second Ares pulled her away from her, denying himself the orgasm. He hauled her upwards by her elbows and stared straight into her eyes without saying a word before he threw her backward onto the bed just as he slithered over her and grinned. That smile made her blood run cold; she wondered again if he even really saw her or knew what he was doing or if he was really in there somewhere. Those deep dark eyes of his were completely empty like a sleepwalker in the night. “Ares?” Self-preservation kicked in as she grabbed his forearms and began to push him away. Just as she thought, it was like trying to move a solid brick wall.

Ares grabbed up her hands and pinned her arms down at the sides of her head. His large mitts crushing against her upper arms, Alena felt her fingers go numb within seconds. “Be still, woman,” the God of War hissed as he increased the pressure in his grasp, pushing down on her with almost of all of his weight to pin her below him. “Don’t move.” He entered her in one swift thrust, making her cringe and let out a loud whimper.

Between the force of his weight on her hips and that on her arms, Alena couldn’t move if the cave were on fire. Trying to think of those never-ending green fields of home, Alena closed her eyes so she didn’t have to look at the indifference she saw staring back at her. She tried not to cry out as he worked that massive tool in and out of her in the rapid jabbing thrusts of a rabid wolf. Hoping to make him cum faster, she tried to move her hips in time with his, but that was a mistake. Suddenly the hands on her arms clamped down on her hips and pressed them against the bed.

Using the leverage under his palms, Ares pushed himself up on his hands and hovered over her. “I said don’t move, didn’t I?” Her eyes were closed. “Look at me!”

Alena forced her gray eyes open but tried to keep the image of the moors in her mind instead of the sight of his angry face. “Yes,” she whimpered. “Please. Don’t. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry? You’re always sorry,” Ares seethed, caught by surprise as he stared at the fear in her eyes. She was afraid, terrified actually, but behind the fear there was love staring back at him. “It’s pathetic. Weak. Like you.” Rising to a sitting position on his knees, Ares reached down and turned Alena on her side. “Just stay still, that’s not too much to ask, is it?”

“No.”

When he turned her over, Alena’s silver hair covered her face, and he brushed it away so that he could see her. Eyes closed and lips drawn downward in a fearful frown, she curled up in a little ball beneath him. For a long moment Ares perched between her legs, soaking inside of her, sliding his hands along her smooth trembling body. Ares grabbed up her wrists in one hand and took hold of the round hump of her ass with the other. Pinning her hands high up behind her head, he leaned down over her. “Do you love me?”

Although her voice was small and cracked, Alena didn’t hesitate to answer. “Yes, with all my heart.”

“Do anything I say?”

Alena flinched as a little groan escaped her lips she tried to hold it back at the last second so he wouldn’t know how afraid he was making her. Just a few nights ago she would have said yes to that question with a great deal of zeal and delight. Tonight the question was dark, foreboding. Yet the answer was the same. “Yes.”

“Good.” Ares pulled out of her tight hole, picked her up by the waist and put her on her knees with her pear-shaped ass high in the air before he entered her again. “Grab the headboard.” When she didn’t jump to his command, Ares grabbed her hand and tried to put it on the top of the headboard but she pulled it back at the last second. “Do it or I will.”

“Why?”

Whether she was asking why he wanted her to grab the headboard or why he was doing this to her, Ares didn’t know and he didn’t care. “I’ll show you.” One strong hand on her hip keeping her in place, the other landed on the top of the headboard. He pulled himself forward with all of the strength in his arm as he thrust into her with such force it propelled her off her knees and she tipped forward, her head smashing into the hardwood at the top of the bed.

“Oh God!” Alena shrieked as the pain ripped through her. She became sure that Ares’ swollen throbbing cock was going to pierce its way all the way up through to her stomach.

“Yes?” Ares answered with a sneer. “You rang?”

“I’ll do it,” she gasped, “please don’t. I’ll do it.” She reached with one shaking hand to clutch the wooden headboard.

“You can be taught, interesting. You have so much to learn about me.” Now was as good a time as any. If she were going to spend the next one or two hundred years in his bed then Alena might as well start getting used to a few facts.

The same tool he used to bring her to the heights of pleasure now brought her to the deepest depths of despair as he thrust in and out of her with increasing force, each stroke longer, deeper than the one before. She tried not to move but it was difficult to remain still, to just perch there and take it rather than squirming away. Not that she had anywhere to go now that she was pinned between the headboard and the God of War. Inside her, Ares just kept growing harder and longer, pummeling her like a jackhammer against a hard pit of road. Much to her agony and dismay, it wasn’t long before Ares became dissatisfied with the position and rose from his knees to his haunches for better purchase. Behind her, he let out a grunt that she hoped meant he was coming to climax but then one of the hands on her ass gave it harsh squeeze before it dealt out a heavy slap, making her jump below him and those wet muscles constrict tightly around his throbbing cock. Ares reached around with the other hand and roughly groped her trembling breast before giving her ass another loud smack.