Wanderlust Page 5

  The outside world was terrifying, but here inside this large tin box on wheels, none of that could touch me. Only he could touch me. Even as I sobbed in his arms, I felt his erection harden beneath me. He made no move to use it on me, not yet, but I had no doubts that he would. That was my purpose here.

  Eventually, I quieted, sniffling every so often. I may have even drowsed that way, still affected by whatever drug he had given me.

  “It’s okay.” he said, his lips pressed against the crown of my head. “You’re so pretty when you cry.”

  I felt myself blush even as my stomach turned over. But I couldn’t hate myself for the small pleasure I took. There were so few pleasures in life, and even less in the back of this truck, but I could accept his compliments. I could accept his pleasure too.

  There were some men you didn’t say no to.

  I wriggled my body experimentally. I told myself it was only to test my limits, but maybe there was a part of me that wanted to seduce him. It was sick, but I wanted him to touch me more, to hold me tighter. I wanted the intimacy from last night in the absence of any true connections in the whole wide world.

  I didn’t know him at all, but he had touched the deepest part of me and in my own way, I had touched the deepest part of him too. There was a strange but addictive magic to sex. It tied a thin string from his soul to mine with every joining, and I wondered how many times it would take before we were inseparable. They were fanciful thoughts, but I felt that way—like dreaming, like lightness. He would bring me back down. He would ground me.

  Scooting aside, I placed my hand on him, there. The denim was stiff against my palm, no give at all. I paused, glancing up at him.

  Surprise was in his eyes, and lust too. “Go on, sunshine. You want to see what I look like? How I’m made? Take it out.”

  Carefully, I unzipped his jeans and opened the flaps. He wore nothing underneath, and he fell heavily into my palm, thick and long. The skin was silky smooth against my palm. I closed my fingers around it, and it jumped.

  “That’s right,” he praised. “Touch my cock. Stroke it for me, baby. Make it good and hard so I can fuck you with it.”

  It was so wrong, but I let it happen. So dirty, and it washed over me. If I went into a sort of trance, he couldn’t really hurt me. It even felt good. Wasn’t that better than pain? Than fear? My mother had lived in fear, and she was safe—but she was still afraid. I was the opposite of safe here, but I didn’t have to be afraid. Maybe that was the ultimate freedom.

  I tightened my fingers around his length and tugged. His cock. That was the word he used. Tentatively, I slipped my hand down and then up again.

  He groaned. “More. Again.”

  I stroked him until his hips bucked into my hands, and I found a sort of power there. In bringing him pleasure, I empowered myself. I could wield it in the withholding of pleasure, hesitating before the next stroke to hear him beg. A small rebellion, like syrup for my pancakes.

  “Get on the bed.” His voice came out gutturally.

  I lay down on my back, my legs slightly parted. Together enough to hide me from sight, but the small space between them was a message—I wouldn’t say no to him. But he didn’t climb between them, not yet. He knelt astride my body, a knee on either side, his cock resting thickly in the valley between my breasts.

  He rolled my nipples between his fingers, setting off sparks that I felt down to my core. Harder, he pinched. I whimpered in response, but that made him tighten further. Only when my hips bucked up of their own accord did he release me. He pushed my breasts together, wrapping the pliant flesh around his cock.

  With slow glides, he thrust between them. It should have done nothing for me. They were just breasts, and he wasn’t even stimulating them really. He was just using them for his own pleasure. But the sight of the dark head of his cock excited me as it peeked from between my pale skin.

  The feel of the dampness in the crevice as his tip leaked his seed. The sound of his pants above me, growing harsher, more ragged. Heat gathered in my sex, and with nothing to assuage it, my legs fell open, begging without words, without thought.

  He noticed, glancing back with his cock still trapped between my breasts. “Goddamn,” he breathed. “You are too perfect. I can’t let you go.”

  It almost broke the spell, that reference to how I’d come to be here in the back of this truck. Almost, but I held onto the trance, to the cloud of arousal that made this all okay.

  “Please,” I whispered. “Help me.”

  “Yeah. Oh yeah.”

  He sounded incredulous, and why shouldn’t he? How many captives would have been willing participants in this? How many captives had he had? But I had learned early on to make the best of my situation, to flourish even under hothouse lights, within glass walls.

  “You’re so good, pet,” he said, climbing down my body. My legs were already open to him, already damp. He bent his head, pressing a kiss to the top of my mound. “This is your treat.”

  With unaccountable tenderness, he licked me, first around the soft lips, and that was shocking enough, but then he slipped his tongue into the damp crevice and swirled higher to the tight bundle of nerves. My legs shook where he had hooked them over his shoulders. I cried out, but he didn’t relent, didn’t let up until another blinding light overtook me, this one painful too, but also wonderful. There was no air in that place, no thought or fear in the pleasure, only his tongue and my skin and the shudders that racked my body.

  He turned me over so that my face and breasts and belly pressed against the musty mattress. I waited for him to enter me from behind, as he had done last night. Instead, I felt him rustle behind me, heard the quiet snick of plastic. Coolness shocked the heated skin of my bottom as his fingers rubbed a sort of gel. But not where I thought it would go. He was putting it there, on a hole I never imagined could be violated.

  I let out a soft cry of protest.

  A light slap hit my thigh. “Quiet now. Just relax and it will be fine.”

  But I couldn’t. I tensed against the invasion. It felt like stretching, like burning, and I knew it would only get worse. “Please.”

  He bent his mouth to my knee, speaking softly. “Am I shocking you?”

  “I didn’t know—”

  “Well, now you do, sunshine. And you know what else? I think you’re more adventurous than you let on. You’ve been sheltered, that much is clear. Well, you’re going to expand your horizons with me.”

  I sobbed against the coarse blanket, feeling pinned but also freed. There was nothing I could do in this position, no way to get free.

  “You need a good cry,” he said thoughtfully. “Yes, I think so.”

  I wished he were more certain. I liked his aggression better than his twisted consideration. I wanted him to hurt me, not help me.

  “Do it already.” I balled my hands into fists. “Just do what you’re going to do.”

  He froze for a minute. I felt his surprise. Then he chuckled softly. “You are perfect, aren’t you? It’s like you were made just for me.” He shifted, pressing the blunt head against my puckered skin. “Don’t tense or you might tear yourself up.”

  His words grated on me. I might tear myself up, as if this were my doing, as if I’d asked for any of this. Oh God, had I? Had I secretly longed for a cage to replace the one I’d left? Something inside me whispered yes. He was right about me being made just for him. I was an animal bred in captivity, unprepared for the harshness of the wild.

  Pressure built behind me as he forced himself farther. I knew he’d only just started but it felt like far too much, like he’d split me open, like he was pressing the butt of a baseball bat inside me. I squirmed, fearful and impatient all at once. I wished he would do it quickly, ripped off like a band-aid—shove it in. But then I’d tear, and he cared enough about me to prevent that. That hurt worst of all, that small bit of respect. It showed he could feel compassion if he wanted to. It showed me how little I really had from him.

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p; It burned, drawing out shuddering sighs and rasping sobs from my throat. With a burst of pressure that brought tears to my eyes, he pushed his way inside and sank in with a deep, satisfied groan.

  “Oh, sweetheart,” he said. “Oh, sunshine.”

  He sounded strangled, hoarse with the pleasure he took from my body. Beneath the physical sensation, I heard the gratitude in his voice, the awe, and I felt a perverse camaraderie over that. Weren’t we both so surprised, weren’t we both a little shell-shocked to find ourselves in the middle of a felony sex act in the back of an eighteen-wheeler in the middle of nowhere?

  This hadn’t been on the calendar. Appease kidnapper with butt sex hadn’t been on my life plan, but then I’d never really had a plan. That had been the point. I had wanted to wander, to flit, and I’d flown right into a spider’s web.

  His hand slipped around between my legs, searching and probing until his fingers lit upon the tight nub that made me buck my hips and groan. It did more than ease the pain, it swung it around and upside down, turned it into a razor-sharp pleasure. I rutted against his fingers, seeking relief in the form of ecstasy—they came together, a package deal.

  I felt a little nauseous too. My body was overwhelmed, and it wanted to lose whatever was in my stomach. I shuddered, forcing myself to swallow the muted bile, as my body was wrenched forward and back, impaled and fondled, used and taken in ways I had barely ever imagined, hardly ever thought of except in my room when the blanket of night shielded even my thoughts. I would touch myself exactly this way, face-down on the bed with my hand underneath, rocking my hips until my mouth became dry and my toes curled up tight and my mind exploded into white-hot bliss.

  I cried out, lost in the heat of it, the all-encompassing pain of it as my stretched skin contracted and pulsated around his cock.

  “Yes, that’s right,” he muttered thickly. “Milk me. Use me. Take it all.”

  A sudden warmth bathed my insides, the salt stinging the raw flesh. I shuddered at the pain of it, the price of my own pleasure. He rested his weight on me, and I absorbed his contented sigh with my body, cradled him as best I could while facing away. At length, he pulled free.

  He gently rubbed the abused skin in the crevice of my ass. Slow strokes, tender strokes.

  “Feel better?” he asked.

  I would have expected that to make it worse. It had already been pummeled. This would be like pressing on a bruise. But his touch was sure and knowing, and some of the tension eased.

  “Yes. How did you know?”

  My speech came out slurred, and only then did I realize how tired I was. Strange, since I had slept for so long. It was a stupid question, too. Of course he had done this before, had sex with women, some willing, some not. He was only taking care of me because he wanted to use me again, putting away his toys so he could play again in the morning.

  Everything seemed fuzzier, softer. He’d drugged my drink again, I realized, but I couldn’t summon up the will to care. Here in this place there was no pain or fear, and the whole idea seemed just grand. Yes, keep me and play with me. Do the things I never would have the courage to do on my own and keep me safe in the process.

  “Because it always helped me,” he said in a low voice.

  It took me a minute to realize he was answering my question. This had been done to him. Had he liked it? Who’d done it? But the questions were too heavy on my tongue, and I drifted away to sleep. The last thought before I lost consciousness was to wonder if he had been willing.

  CHAPTER SIX

  The longest vertical drop is over 165 feet.

  The next time I woke up, my head was much clearer. Unfortunately, my body was coming apart. I felt every bump and rattle of the truck from my pounding headache to the rumble of my stomach. But that only fueled my determination.

  What was happening to me? This needy girl, desperate to please with sex and obedience—that wasn’t me. I wanted freedom, but freedom wasn’t worth much if I let other people take it away with a snap of their fingers, with a passive-aggressive threat or a pill dropped into a soda. I had escaped once before, from my mother’s house, and I would do it again.

  This would be even easier because I didn’t care about Hunter. It would be nothing at all to hurt him and get away. So as we bounced in an uneasy rhythm along some unseen highway, I tried to gather some strength into my tired limbs, some awareness into my dark-dampened mind.

  When he opened the back of the truck, I staggered out. It was so bright. So…much. Even the air on my skin felt overwhelming. Only a small amount of time kept away from it had weakened me. I scanned the treeline, looking for an escape route. His hand clamped onto my shoulder.

  “Not so fast, sunshine. You stay with me.”

  True to his word, he led me into the bushes. We stopped at a patch of grass, and I understood this was where I should do my business.

  I raised my eyebrows at him in a tacit plea for privacy.

  His face was implacable. No.

  Miserable, humiliated, I squatted down and sent a warm stream of liquid into the earth. He handed me a wipe from his pocket. After cleaning myself, I clutched it awkwardly.

  “You can leave it on the ground. Those are biodegradable.”

  Oh great, an eco-conscious kidnapper. I tossed the wipe against the base of a tree and then realized his hand had left my shoulder at some point. We weren’t touching at all, and suddenly, the air between seemed like a question—will you run? I stood still, indecisive. I knew I wouldn’t get away like this. I could never run fast enough or fight him off. It was a question of obedience.

  “You surprised me yesterday, being such a good girl,” he said, grabbing my wrist. “Don’t stop now.”

  For a minute, I was distracted from his words. Yesterday? It seemed like only hours had passed. I was losing time here. That was somehow scarier than anything he had done to me. I had lost enough time trapped in my mother’s house. I couldn’t afford to give away any more. I hoped he wouldn’t drug me again. It occurred to me that he might not, if he thought I wouldn’t run. That was when I registered what he had said about being pleased with me. And he hadn’t led me to the back of the truck, but to the cab.

  I stumbled out of the leaves-strewn ground, allowing myself to be tugged toward the road. Suddenly he stopped, and I ran right into his side. He yanked at my wrist, pulling me behind him.

  Startled, I peeked around him to see a large cat with black and orange stripes.

  A very large cat.

  “Is that…?”

  “A tiger. Yeah.”

  Though the size was abnormal for a regular housecat, it was the eyes that were different. Both more beautiful and colder. Crueler. A predator who was considering her attack. On the one hand, it seemed silly to worry over an animal physically smaller than us. On the other hand, I felt her ferocity in her stare, her stance, and I had no doubt she could cause either one of us considerable damage if she wanted to attack.

  She hadn’t moved a single paw since we’d arrived in her clearing. Only her whiskers twitched, gathering data from the wind.

  I whispered. “Should we—”

  “We’re just going to walk real slow around her. She won’t attack unless she feels threatened.”

  “Right, but—“

  “Just move. Nice and easy.”

  We shuffled around her. In a shocking act of chivalry, Hunter was careful to always stay between the cat and my body.

  When we’d made it to the other side, I quickened my step and snapped a twig. The cat’s ears flicked. She lowered her head.

  “Easy,” he said sharply. Then softer, “Go easy. Nice and slow all the way back.”

  We shuffled in a sort of dance back into the rest stop where the truck was parked, continuing to move slowly and keep facing the woods until we reached the cab.

  He opened the passenger door, and instead of waiting for me to climb in the tall steps, practically threw me inside. He circled the truck and got in.

  “Shit,” he said.<
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  I swallowed. “She was gorgeous.”

  “Yeah. Good thing I didn’t have to kill her.”

  My face scrunched up. “Could you have? I mean, if she had attacked?”

  “A tiger’s pretty vicious when they want to be, even a little undergrown thing like that one. But a gun is better.”

  I gasped, eyeing him up and down. “Where?”

  “My boot. Don’t leave home without it.”

  “So wait. Why didn’t you get it out then? We could have died.”

  “Nah, probably not. She’d have launched herself, I’d have blocked, and she’d have caught my arm. It would’ve got torn up pretty bad, but that’s it. She was too malnourished to do much. That’s why she’s so close to a rest stop. Must be near to starving to chance it.”

  I tried to calm myself though inside I felt shivery, bordering on hysterical. “Okay. Here’s a question. Why was there a tiger in the woods? In Texas.”

  “There’s more tigers in Texas than in India. The old travelling circuses let them loose when they disbanded, and since then they’ve maintained a steady population.” He reached back and rustled in some bags behind the seats. “Most people think they’re large cats. I’ve seen them before but never that close.”

  He tossed big slabs of jerky packaged in shrink wrap onto my lap.

  “Open those up.”

  Without a word, I tugged at the little slit in the corner and pulled out the savory meat.

  He drove up to where we’d reenter the freeway but rolled a little ways onto the grass. He hit the button and rolled down the window.

  “Throw it out there. Far as you can.”

  I stared at him for a minute, but he just waited. Sighing, I turned and tossed one of the pieces of meat onto the grass.

  His exhalation was derisive. “That as far as you can get it?”