Withholding Secrets (22 page)

“Maybe we are just part of it.” Sitting up, he covered his yawn quickly. His glassy eyes came back to mine as he smiled. “Maybe Kane’s the other part. He really likes you a lot, Keri.”

“You two are my life now. Sometimes you have to give up something else to keep what you really want.” Hearing the door close upstairs, my heart sank hard in my stomach. Last night, falling asleep in his arms had been so easy, so peaceful for a change, even though I had to break Sky out of my own house. “Get some rest. You have to go to school in the morning.”

“You said that we were a team, Keri. You want us to be happy, and we want you to be happy. Coach Kane can be part of our team. You don’t have to become a nun because you have us. You need to live also.” Pointing to the door, he smiled as he waved his hand. “He’s never looked at anyone else like he has you. Don’t let him walk away.”

“He already did.” Forcing my tears back, I turned and walked to the staircase. With each step, my heart fell more and more. Getting to the kitchen, I noticed that the windows were tinted more for better privacy. Now, to find the room where Kane was hiding me. Like that would be easy. All I noticed again was a living room that my whole house could fit into and a kitchen that was my complete dream. Making my way through the kitchen, I looked at the backyard and froze. Kane was sitting outside in a black expensive looking lawn chair and a drink in his hand. Noticing a door, I tapped on the glass afraid to open it. He said that the alarms were on, so I didn’t want to just walk out.

He reached up without even looking back and waved his hand. Nudging the door open, I slipped out and walked over to him. The cool brisk air nipped at my shirt, and I swallowed hard. “The kids are pretty much asleep.”

“I thought Sky was going to fall asleep at dinner.” Swirling the ice in the glass, he held it up, looking at the amber liquid inside of it. “I will see about getting your place set up with an alarm system, but you’re not going back until I do.”

“Speaking of that, I thought you said that they were active.” Shoving my hands deep into the soft denim of my new jeans, I closed my eyes, taking in a deep breath of the fresh air and the mix of Kane clashing with the chlorine of the pool water.

“They are. All except for that one.” He pointed at the door behind us. “Do you want to know the secret?”

Nodding, I opened my eyes to see those emeralds that were full of hurt looking at me. He waved his hand over, drawing me closer. It was the killing light, but that bug just couldn’t stop from going into it.

As I bent closer to him, his lips came close to my ear and his hand brushed my hip. Fires burst through my body as his breath warmed the sensitive skin of my neck. “The secret is…” he brushed my hip again, intensifying the heat. “…one that I’m not going to share with you.”

My mouth hung open as I just stared at him.

“I’m locking you and the kids down, Keri. I’m not letting you go yet until I know for damn sure the three of you are safe.” His eyes stayed locked on mine, the heat from him shot up again, and his hand clamped down on my hip, holding me in his forces.

“Why? Why are you doing this to us?” The tears stung my eyes. Maybe I was wrong about Kane. Maybe he wasn’t a good person like I thought he was.

“I’m doing this for you.” His lips brushed against my tingling skin, just enough for the heat to slam to the lower region of my body. Tingles gathered in my lower regions, and no matter how much I squeezed my thighs together, those fires were not dying out. “You will do anything to keep those kids safe, and I will do anything to keep the three of you safe. Welcome into my world, Keri.”

“Kane,” his name came out huskily from my lips as I closed my eyes, resting my hands on his shoulders, “is this something that you really want? We are not the type who can handle someone else walking away from us.”

“I’ve been trying to walk away, Keri. It hasn’t been possible since the day you started throwing your color crayons at me.” He put the glass down on the metal table next to him and cupped his hand over my other hip, drawing me to his lap. Taking position on his lap, the desire stung even more, lava was beginning to pool into my lady parts, and I needed him to put the fire out before I fully engulfed into flames.

“Why do you keep throwing that in my face?”

“Because it was the moment that you colored my life screwed up. It was that moment I was seeing just how damn sexy you were.” Nipping at my neck, I felt him stiffen under me as he shifted his weight a little more to give me more room and access to him. “It was the moment that I really saw why you had those kids and refused to let them go.”

“Kane.” With him nipping and nuzzling that soft spot on my neck close to my ear, I pressed into him, feeling the harness that developed in his jeans. I never needed to have a man touch me in the worst way until now, and it was torture, pure torture. My body ached for him, burned for him in places that never burned before, and I needed him to do something before I just managed to fizzle out my own desire right there.

“God, Keri. See what you have been doing to me? It was like this every time I thought about you, saw you, or even heard your name. You think that this is torture for you?” His hands dug into my back, pressing my chest hard against his. His mouth devoured my neck, biting, nipping, and licking me and bringing me to a fast urge of unbelievable pleasure. “I can’t take you out here.”

“But the kids…”

“They’re fine. They won’t hear anything.” In one swift move, he was on his feet with my legs wrapped tightly around his waist. The comfort of the house embraced us as he stepped in, closing the door behind him. Going straight to the box on the wall, he set the alarm again, and went through the living room, his eyes concentrating on where he was going, as if this place was all new to him, too. Just like the basement door, another door was hidden in the wall, looking like a fancy molding on the wall. Carrying me over to the king sized bed with the red comforter perfectly draped over it, he carefully laid me down. His eyes glistened in the soft lighting. “I need to get those pants off you, and your leg redressed.”

“Kane, don’t worry about my leg.” Wrapping my arms around his neck, I pulled him closer to me, taking his mouth, needing the air from his lungs into mine. He obliged with a deep and hungry growl vibrating through his chest. “I need you, Kane.”

“Leg first.” Pulling back, he let his head hang for a moment before his eyes lifted to mine. The desire coated through me so thickly, I wasn’t sure if I could survive another minute without him. “I need to fix your leg first.”

Tears swelled in my eyes as he disappeared behind a black door just as the basement rooms had. The light came on and he returned just to gather me and carry me to the bathroom that was three times the size of the club’s living room. Placing me with my feet on the cold tiled white floor, his fingers slipped into the waist of my jeans as he worked the button open, his eyes glued to mine. Those greens that were darkening with raging desire by the second.

“Nobody has ever gotten to me like you have.” His lips brushed my forehead allowing his eyes to finally breaking the hold. Leaning into him, I let the warmth of his hands roam over my hips, nudging the denim down, leaving the thin fabric of the cotton bikini panties. “Something so very simple and yet so sexy, Keri.”

Bracing myself against his chest, my head swam, drunk on him. His body began to slide down as he inched the jeans down my legs, gently peeling the one leg away from the gash that leaked some more blood. I cringed a little, causing his hair to brush against my hot flesh and his lips pressing against the thumping flesh of my thigh. Resting my hands on his shoulders, I moaned a little reaching the edge of the orgasmic cliff; that moment where if he were to just touch me again, I would explode into a world of ecstasy. One I wasn’t sure I’d ever experienced before.

I had never been like that; never that responsive over something so simple as to have him help me remove the denim from the cut, press an antiseptic cloth to the gash in my leg, or even having the ounce of eye contact as he did with me. It was all Kane. It was all that sexy god with the back hair and those emeralds that glistened with the fiercest hunger. No wonder why all the women dropped themselves at the blink of his eye. I could see why now. He was a sexual magician with the way he was able to do anything and turn it into an instant orgasm.

“You are so beautiful, Keri.” His voice deepened into a low husk as he cupped the backs of my thighs.

“Kane.” Automatically, my head tipped backward, his lips brushing against my skin around the gash.

“Are you always this responsive?” His eyes came up, meeting mine, as I raked my fingers through his hair and drew my bottom lip through my teeth in hopes of keeping me from begging for attention.

I shook my head, biting my lip hard. This had to be a dream. This wasn’t real. It couldn’t be. This wasn’t the way that sex was. These feelings were only in books and movies; nothing that ever happened in real life. I knew that from experience. I would wake up in the morning disappointed, but I would put my clothes on and head on into work, not giving this another thought. That was how it had always been in the past. Nothing “
electrifying
”. I was a young woman with two teenagers now. I was just fantasizing.

“Up you go.” His hands cupped me, lifting me to the granite counter that housed a white porcelain sink with a brass fixture. Twisting me to the side, he draped my leg over the sink and grabbed the brown bottle of
peroxide
. “This is going to sting, but we have to clean it.”

Gritting my teeth, I watched him remove the cap and pick up the white washcloth. Stepping tight to the sink, he wrapped his hand on my back and pressed me close to him.

“Bite my shoulder, scream, whatever you need to do. The walls are soundproof in this room.”

“So your weekend dates won’t be heard?” I bit out harshly, and I couldn’t believe that I said that aloud. The last thing that I wanted to do was to offend the one man who was trying to help us, and driving me insane with desire in the process.

“There has only been two women that ever crossed that doorway.” His eyes came up to mine, and I waited for a cocky smirk or a hint of a lie. But nothing passed through those emerald green eyes that told me he was joking.

“How long have you owned the place?”

“Going on seven years now.” Just as I opened my mouth, he attacked me hungrily, his kiss deepening and his tongue darting in and out of my mouth just enough to cause my internal volcano to spill over with lava that spewed into every nook and cranny my body had. “Keri, you have to stop looking at me like that, or I swear I will take you right here, right now.”

“Yeah. I would like to see that.” Rolling my eyes, I huffed. It was all a fantasy, right? There would be no possible way that a man like him would ever want a woman who was tied down with two kids. His weekends were spent clubbing, not having family time. Guys these days just weren’t into that sort of thing.

“Not yet. I will, though.”

“And why not?” I challenged, but not because I was just trying to get him to. Only this fantasy. I would wake up any second to realize that he was parked in my driveway, dropping us off at home, ready to wash his hands from us. That’s it. I just fell asleep in the truck after the exhausting past twenty-four hours. All a dream.

He poured the cold liquid over the gash, causing me to jump. The gnawing pain made me want to reach for my leg to stop the severe stinging. Damn. It burned as the foamy bubbles were multiplying by the second. That would have been enough to wake me from the dream, but I was still sitting there, Kane tight to the sink with one leg on one side of him while the other was contorted over the sink. The hissing of the bubbling liquid in the bottom of the sink caught my attention.
This had to be a dream, a fantasy
.

His mouth came down on mine, taking my mind away from the searing pain that was eating at the flesh of the wound. Still, I hadn’t woken up to be at my house or in his truck. I was locked in this dream!

Dumping the liquid over the gash a few times, it finally settled down to a manageable sting until nothing at all. With gentle hands, he dressed it and wrapped it with the gauze roll. Lifting me from the sink, he carried me to the bedroom where he placed me on the comforter.

“My mom had a saying also, you know.” His dark brows shot up as he grabbed the bottom of his shirt. In one swift move, it was over his head and he was tossing it to the side of the room. Scars were spread across his chest in long lines, some jagged, but mostly straight. Some over his shoulders and on his upper arms. When he turned around, they were all over his back to the waist of his jeans. The muscle moved and tightened as he went to the door, closing it. “The kids know where the room is if they need us, and the alarm will sound in here if someone opens a door or window.”

“Why all this? The alarms? The hidden doors?” I laid back admiring the beauty that God had created in front of me. But he had so many scars, and all over.

“I like my privacy, and I pay good money to keep it that way.” When his eyes came back to me, a wicked grin spilled over his face.

“What’s the saying that your mom used?” I folded my hands behind my head, watching him move around the room, hesitating his next move. He was contemplating whether he wanted to continue or let this fizzle out.

“If you don’t try something, you will never know if you like it.” He ran his hands through his hair as the grin had disappeared into something different. It was clear that he wanted this, but he wasn’t sure that he should. For our sake, I hoped that he didn’t. The three of us couldn’t have someone else walk out, leaving us in the dust again.