Page 54 of Triggered By Love
“Never. I want to keep you safe, and I do have to do a little checking.” He turned north on the highway, away from the city.
“You mean work? I’m sorry. I can see I’m distracting you. You can drop me off at that motel.” She pointed out the window.
“I can do better than that.” He managed to squeeze a grin onto his lips. “How about a hunting cabin with lots of guns?”
“You have internet up there?’
“Of course. Plumbing and generator, but no hot water.”
“No hot water?” She hugged herself and shivered, but the smile was bright on her face. “Guess you’ll be taking a lot of cold showers.”
“Not alone, I won’t.”
* * *
Avery was being bad,and she didn’t care.
She’d been living like a clam, suppressing herself, paranoid and defeated for so long, she’d forgotten why she was still alive.
She was flexing her muscles and thrumming with the power emanating from Jason’s muscle car. She wished it was a convertible, and she could let her hair fly, but the rumbling of the sturdy tires and being shoulder to shoulder with Jason was more invigorating than the cappuccino she’d quaffed.
She was tired of being scared, and this evening, when that sedan stalked her in the orchard, she realized she’d been a mouse hiding in a hole.
She’d denied her senses, her tastes, her appetites, her passions. It was a wonder she was even able to design clothes, although the flashes of color and the bold strokes were the only signs of a prisoner still alive inside her self-imposed jail cell of fear.
Dusk had turned to darkness when they drove up a potholed road deep underneath the canopy of dense trees.
“It’s so remote.” She was amazed at how rustic it’d gotten only a few miles up the Hudson River.
“We weren’t followed.” Jason pulled the car behind a stand of thick bushes. “There are two bunks in one of the rooms, so don’t feel obliged.”
Oh, she wasn’t obliged, not at all. He’d saved her life twice, but that had nothing to do with her wanting to spend time with him. There was something about him that she wanted to probe—a source of deep pain he’d kept cooped up inside of him.
She could sense it when he gazed at his mother’s beautiful paintings and the way his uncle had treated him with kid gloves.
He handed her a flashlight and let her go inside. “I have to turn on the water and get the generator going.”
“It’s okay. I like the dark.” She hated leaving his side, but the cabin was hidden, and she hadn’t seen any headlights or taillights once they’d turned off the highway.
He was back as soon as the lights came on. “There’s a thunderstorm brewing out there.”
“In here, too.” She sidled up to him and kissed him on his lightly bearded cheek.
His gaze on her was intense, focused, and hungry, and he paused a moment, lightly running the back of his fingers down the side of her face.
He wanted her, but he’d wait for a signal, and she appreciated it. He wasn’t the type of guy to put on the brakes for long. Heat radiated from his muscular body, and the piney, woodsy scent in the cabin along with the sexual tension crackling through the air was the harbinger of a furious storm.
“I want you, Jason,” she said, knowing he needed the verbal consent.
Their lips crashed together as thunderclaps rumbled outside and fat drops of rain splattered over the tin roof. Avery wasn’t ready for the power in Jason’s assault. The rough taste of his lips and the way his mouth devoured hers shot sparks over her entire body.
She clutched on to him, jockeying her mouth and tongue with his, wondering why no one had ever kissed her this hard. He was rough, wild, pushing her back until she was pressed against the wall. She’d always been treated like she was made of spun glass or delicate lace, and her response usually simmered slowly.
But this was like an explosion of dynamite. She grasped and grappled with him, digging her fingertips against his hard muscles. Heat flared and desire pooled between her legs. Her breasts tingled, perking up and crying to be fondled, and she surprised herself by sucking and licking his mouth and moaning like a porn star.
What was going on?
No time to analyze, because her hands went wild, crawling underneath Jason’s shirt and raking over his hot skin. She could visualize herself undoing his belt, but not yet; she’d never been that aggressive. She’d been a good girl, waiting her turn, but there was nothing good about her right now.
