Promises in the Dark Read online

  Shitty timing, she had to admit. She brushed the tears impatiently from her cheeks with the back of her free hand, the other still clutching the gun, pointed in the direction Zane told her to.

  Zane. His face flashed before hers, those blue eyes holding secrets of their own, deeper than those of the all-American boy he resembled. There was something harder about his face, sharper in his expression. Maybe it had to do with the military training, and maybe not.

  She continued to wait, shifted as quietly as she could, the pins and needles in her legs driving her crazy, the silence more so.

  And then the burst of gunfire, which made her wish for silence.

  Yelling. Shots. Smoke.

  Her heart beat fast, her eyes watered and her mouth went dry. She jumped at an explosion—too close for comfort. The ground shook beneath her for a brief moment and she remembered too late to cover her ears.

  She held the gun tight, pointed outward to face a still-invisible enemy. Waited so long that she felt sore. Her head throbbed from tension.

  Earlier, she’d wanted nothing more than Zane gone. Now she waited for his return with rabid intensity.

  She wouldn’t hear him come back if he did. When he did. All she could do was sit tight. Be helpless, again.

  She wondered if there would ever be a time she actually felt in control—or actually would be—and realized that it wasn’t going to happen for the foreseeable future.

  She counted the seconds because it was all she could do. When she realized it had been nearly half an hour of silence, panic set in. She smelled smoke, heard groaning—or maybe it was her imagination, or an animal, but all she could think of was Zane hurt and she was sitting here doing nothing, when she could be helping.

  He told you not to move.

  Yes, well, she’d been told a lot of things in her life. Didn’t mean she’d listened to all of them.

  Crawling out of the brush, she could barely see her hand in front of her face. She put the safety on the gun because she was so jumpy, she didn’t want it going off accidentally. Hands stretched out in front of her, she began to walk in the direction of the smoke, bumping into trees she feared were people, tripping … and then she realized just how turned around she was.

  Stupid. She was stupid for moving. But she had to find him … Did she dare call his name?

  No.

  God, what if she was alone here? She choked back a sob—barely—turned in a desperate attempt to backtrack, when a hand clamped over her mouth, arms held her tight, and she cursed herself for not thinking about watching her back.

  She slammed her elbow back hard once, again, flailing against the person who held her. And then the ground seemed to give way under her feet. She heard Zane’s muffled curse as they went down together.

  They rolled at a sickeningly fast pace, a tangle of arms and legs, his body absorbing most of the impact. The fact that she couldn’t see anything made it all that much worse and the dizzying spins wouldn’t stop.

  Somehow, Zane managed to shift them so they were no longer rolling but traveling legs-first down the hill. When they hit bottom, his feet stopped them hard, while they remained holding each other tight.

  She could barely breathe.

  “Liv, you all right?” he whispered against her ear. She couldn’t speak if she’d wanted to, so she nodded and hoped he could tell.

  “Catch your breath,” he continued, gave her a few more minutes to do so, and then pulled her away from him the face. “Are you hurt? Anything broken?”

  “No, I think I’m okay,” she whispered. She would be sore as anything tomorrow, as she already ached, but mercifully, all her bones seemed intact. “Oh my God, the gun …”

  She felt for it where she’d shoved it in her pants, but Zane’s hand was already there, taking it away from her.

  When he spoke again, his voice lost the edge of gentleness and became full-on steel. “You’re lucky it didn’t go off and kill us both. Dammit. What happened to don’t move until I get back?”

  “I thought you were hurt, I wanted to help.”

  He cursed softly—a string of them put together; they would’ve sounded fluent and beautiful, if only they weren’t directed at her behavior. “Look, I know you think you’re, like, Super Doctor, able to leap tall buildings and survive all alone out here, but I’ve been doing this a little longer than you. When I say stay put, I mean it. Out here, I’m in charge, and you need to listen to stay alive. Got it?”

  He hauled her to a full standing position and she processed his words for a minute, felt the fight coming back into her body. “Leave me alone.”

  She jerked out of his grasp and nearly fell again. He stopped her from doing so with a strong hand on her arm, said, “Calm down.”

  “Don’t you tell me what to do. Don’t you even try. I don’t need to be directed or forced.” She heard the panic in her voice and was thankful for the total blackout as much as she hated it, because he would’ve seen the shame in her face otherwise, at the sheer helplessness she felt.

  For all she knew, he might be able to see it anyway.

  When he spoke again, his voice still held a tinge of anger. “I’m not DMH, Liv. I’m not your warden. I’m telling you what to do because I know combat better than you do.”

  “Stop acting like you know me so well.”

  “But I do.” Zane’s breath was warm against her ear. And while his hand eased from her arm, his body remained close, as if aware he was actually holding her upright. “I know you so much better than you think. You’re scared as hell, and you’re strong, but right now I wouldn’t trust you to tell me which way is up because you’re so damned turned around.”

  She attempted to struggle away from him but couldn’t—he held her fast against him. She was shaking, her anger not softening in the least. Irrational maybe, but that’s the way it happened these days—it was always unexpected. “Let me go, Zane.”

  “I would, if you really wanted me to.” His arousal pressed against her hip and she realized that she was somehow, inexplicably, turned on, despite everything else at the moment.

  The pull this man exerted over her was incredible, despite her best efforts to throw him off track and push him away. Tenacity and intelligence fueled him, and she let his free hand roam between them until it stopped at the front of her pants. “I want you to.”

  “And I want you to trust me.”

  “I can only trust myself.” She instantly regretted the words, but any attempt to take them back would be futile.

  Besides, he already knew, judging from his next words, which were a rough growl against her cheek. “I know you think I’m some fucking pathetic puppy dog, following you around, believing whatever you say, taking you wherever you want to go, but there’s a hell of a lot you don’t know. And you’re severely overestimating my damned patience.”

  The hard column of his sex thrusted against her, as hard as his voice sounded, and it all made her shudder with need. She wondered if he wanted her to beg, couldn’t read his face, and so she attempted to read him with her hands. Traced his lips with her fingers, let them flutter along his cheekbones, across his nape, while he remained rock steady in front of her.

  She never should’ve agreed to his plan, should’ve taken off on her own.

  You never would’ve made it out of the jungle alive.

  Ten minutes ago, she was worried for both their lives—and now he was safe and in front of her. And pissed, but so was she. And somehow she still couldn’t help the way she melted to him when his mouth captured hers.

  She wondered if she would always relent this easily to him, and then wondered why she was actually thinking about an always with a man she’d known for all of a couple of days.

  “Mad at you,” she managed, her voice breathy and not in the least indignant.

  “So mad at you … so freakin’ stubborn,” he muttered as he yanked down her pants without pretense or gentleness—pulled a leg up so it wound around his, opening her up for him. To him.
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br />   Her mouth opened in a wordless moan as his fingers found her, wet and willing and ready for him.

  They were out in the open, completely obscured by darkness. She could only hear the rasp of his breath close to her ear, could only concentrate on the touch of rough fingertips circling her sex, playing the swollen bundle of nerves with just enough pressure to make her squirm wantonly against him.

  The aches and pains from the fall faded as he braced her against a tree, her shirt providing protection against its roughness.

  She wondered if he knew she was desperately trying to see his face, to make sure it was still him, which was so silly, because she recognized the touches, his scent, all threatening to bring her to that sharp edge of pleasure right here, on what seemed to be the edge of the earth.

  There was something about the jungle that made everything more sensuous, more dangerous. Zane was equal parts of both, about to take her in the middle of nowhere, and she willingly relented.

  “Zane, please …”

  “Please what?” he asked, his voice still fraught with anger.

  “Please take me. Here. Now.”

  “Like I was going to give you the choice,” he growled again, and at his words, her blood ran desperately hot.

  He was inside her then, sheathed by her sex in one long, hard stroke—she was practically climbing him, her arms wrapped around his shoulders as his hands steadied her hips, rocked her against him in a fast rhythm that caused her to lose her breath again, although for a much better reason this time.

  “You like that, little one? Like me filling you, taking you?”

  She wanted to answer, but found she was past the point of making anything but incoherent moans.

  “Take me, Liv … that’s it … you’re going to take me with you when you come.”

  God, he wanted her, all of her, and she got the sickening feeling that he wouldn’t stop until she’d revealed all her secrets to him—and right now, that was all she wanted to do. Wanted him to know everything … wanted him to still want her, despite it all.

  CHAPTER

  11

  Olivia held him inside her with the grip of a velvet fist, her breath coming in fast gasps against his neck. Having her back against the tree gave him more leverage to take her, pour his frustration and his need into making her feel good … as if sex could somehow make her trust him.

  “Zane, yes,” she whispered, the sound lost amid the high-pitched jabbering of the wild dogs that roamed in packs, the low snorting of the hyenas, the wild chatter of the monkeys above them, all of them signaling that the jungle was teeming with life and fraught with dangers he wished neither of them could comprehend.

  Despite the danger—or because of it—she was slowly relinquishing her secrets to him, but this wasn’t only about her. No, he’d started to spill his own secrets—and he already regretted it, was pissed that she’d forced it out of him so quickly and efficiently.

  Why couldn’t he keep it together around her?

  A brutal hunger lunged through him, made his blood boil. Fuck, he burned for her, no matter how hard she tried to shove him away.

  She didn’t want him to go—he knew that—but she made him fight for every inch of ground he gained.

  He wished he didn’t understand that technique as well as he did. Wished that wanting her didn’t make him stupid … wished he hadn’t fallen in love with her somewhere along the way.

  But he had. And her whispered words against his ear made his cock throb inside of her. As much as he wanted this to last, it wouldn’t—not out here. He was too wound up and she was slick—tight and welcoming at the same time, pulling him over the edge as she came, contracting around him, squeezing him so tightly his orgasm slammed through him, nearly taking him down to his knees.

  A desperate groan ripped from his throat and hung in the darkness as the orgasm ran through him like an out-of-control freight train, pounding through his body with a force so intense he lost his breath. He held Liv tightly, as if she was the only thing keeping him on his feet, his pulse hammering.

  He pressed his forehead to hers, not sure what to say—if there was anything to say. Jesus Christ, they could still be in danger and he was buried deep inside of her, a woman he’d sworn to protect.

  “What you do to me,” he said, and immediately her hands went to his cheeks, brushed his too-hot skin.

  “What you do to me,” she murmured in response. “And I like it, Zane. I … might even be fal—”

  She halted the thought but she’d put it out there.

  She’d want to know everything about him—and telling her could be the best thing he could do. Or the worst. Either way, the cat was already too far out of the bag to think about crawling back in.

  Zane lifted her as though she weighed nothing, carried her for what couldn’t have been longer than ten minutes as light rain misted around her face.

  He placed her down and she heard rustling, the pop of a tent opening and then the sound of a zipper. With a hand on her lower back and another on her neck, he told her to bend down and crawl inside, but she couldn’t.

  Instead, she panicked. Breath came in short spurts and the darkness held a million secrets, none of them as pleasant as they’d been when Zane held her.

  “I … can’t,” she managed to choke out, her voice sounding thin and reedy.

  “You have to.” His tone wasn’t threatening and she believed him, knew shelter was the best option now.

  She pushed back against his hands. But he held her firm. “Liv, stop—it’s dark, you can’t run away. You need to go inside the tent for shelter.”

  But she couldn’t see, only the black, gaping maw of the unknown in front of her. “Not … yet.”

  His grip eased a bit. He still held her but didn’t try to push her forward. The ragged gasps began and she sank to her knees completely. His hands remained on her, more a grounding than a guide. Sweat beaded her upper lip. She hated this so much.

  “Liv, honey, it’s okay.” One hand moved to the back of her neck, cool and comforting, the other rubbed her back. “No one’s going to hurt you on my watch. Do you understand? No one.”

  And then she heard a click as he turned on a small penlight, used it to illuminate the tent in front of her. She bent down and looked inside—small, apparently waterproof.

  Safe.

  And still, she stood in place, taking deep breaths. Safe, and so small. A few moments longer, the rain coming down harder. Although partially shielded by Zane’s body hovering over her, she knew she had to go inside.

  “I’ll be with you,” he told her.

  There was nothing inside the tent to harm her—she knew that, and still the logic fought with the panic that clawed at her insidiously from inside.

  Zane’s hand rubbed the back of her neck. She wasn’t sure how long they remained like that, the sounds of the jungle echoing loudly in her ears.

  “We can stay out here if you want,” he told her finally.

  And with those words, the fear eased. She smiled a little, told him, “I’m okay now. It’s always like this for me at an entrance, and then I get over it.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I lived,” she said simply, knowing he couldn’t possibly understand until he heard her whole story. She took a deep breath and crawled inside, the slide of the nylon cool beneath her palms.

  She moved over as he pushed against her, heard the zipper again, and then a low light filled the space. She rubbed her hands together, still felt clammy and not quite herself—but who would be in this place?

  So many new places to enter in so few days—you’d think it would be enough to get her over some of her phobia.

  She realized that the tent was under the protection of a deserted lean-to, not well built at all, but once Zane had slipped the tent over it, it was at least dry, a shelter from the rain.

  “It’s elevated, so we’re in no danger from the mudslides,” he told her. “We can’t go farther now. We’ll wait it out and still be a
ble to make it in time. We’re not getting picked up until closer to daylight.”

  It was just after ten—seemed as though much more time had passed since they left the safety of the small house. Lightning accentuated the low light, and it was only then she noted the bruise over Zane’s left temple, the scratched cheek, the blood on his lip.

  She reached out to touch his face gingerly as thunder boomed over them. “What happened out there?”

  “Let’s just say that my head’s taken a beating since I met you.”

  There was a bump under the bruise, a cut too. She reached for her bag, which he’d piled up behind him, and he moved to let her reach it.

  “Did you lose consciousness?” she asked as she grabbed for the antiseptic.

  “Yes, but not for long,” he admitted. “I’ve worked through much worse.”

  She pressed the gauze to his forehead. “It must hurt.”

  “I don’t have time to think about it.”

  She didn’t say anything else as she put a butterfly bandage on the cut and cleaned the other wounds. Finally, she made herself ask, “Was it DMH?”

  He shook his head. “It was about the baby. They were wearing the same gear as the men who came to the house for him.”

  That could mean the baby was still safe. Most likely, she’d never know, and all she could do was be grateful for that. Could simply remember the happiness on Dahia’s face and the warm beat of the infant’s heart against her chest for that brief time.

  She’d already all but admitted to the issues she had surrounding the first kidnapping. He was one of the few to see her pause at the entrances and he hadn’t asked, had such patience when it came to her.

  She was so impatient with herself for not healing more quickly, couldn’t understand it. “I know you think I’m being unreasonable about all of this. But I can’t be kidnapped a third time, Zane. It would break me.”

  “I won’t let that happen.”