Body Temperature and Rising - Book One of the Lakeland Heatwave Trilogy (21 page)

‘I think you will find the days of your celibacy have come to an end, my dear fellow.’ 

Tim shot Anderson a look over his shoulder. ‘You mean if we all survive.’

‘Indeed. If we all survive. If we do not,’ Anderson shrugged. ‘Being a ghost is not without its merits.’

Then Tim took a deep breath and nodded. ‘Do it. I want you to do it now.’ He thrust hard into Marie for emphasis, and she wrapped her legs around him.

With one hand on the shaft of his penis and the other on Tim’s flank, Anderson positioned himself, then he looked up at Marie. ‘You shall not need a mirror to see what I do to Tim Meriwether, my darling, nor to experience our lust. The link between you and me will show you all. The link between you and Tim will let you feel what I do.’ Then he turned his attention back to Tim. He spat heavily on his hand and rubbed the saliva liberally over his cock. ‘Push out, my dear man,’ he instructed. ‘As I push in, push out.’ Then with a soft grunt, he shoved his cock into Tim’s gape.

‘All the way,’ Tim commanded, holding his breath. ‘I want to know what it feels like.’

Anderson obeyed. The force of his body shoved Tim to new depths inside Marie, who gasped at the sensation, the sensation that was dwarfed as the avalanche of what the two men were feeling added to her own lust.

‘Oh my God!’ Both Tim and Marie cried out. His voice was tense with pain, which, though she felt, was tempered by her own arousal and his thick cock in her pussy.

‘You must relax,’ Anderson instructed, holding very still. ‘If you do not relax you will not feel the pleasure, but only the pain.’

At last Tim caught his breath. ‘All right, I’m ready.’ He sounded more in control. Slowly, carefully, Anderson began to thrust very gently. For the first few strokes Tim held very still, but as his anus dilated to better accommodate Anderson, he began to move against the ghost, then found the rhythm that allowed him to thrust back against Anderson and let Anderson’s momentum drive him forward deep into Marie’s gripping cunt. Both men accelerated the rhythmic in and out, faster and faster, and Marie responded by pushing back against both of them with each thrust. ‘I can feel you,’ she gasped. ‘I can feel both of you, everything you feel, I feel.’

‘Me too,’ Tim gasped. 

‘It is one of the fringe benefits afforded bonded ghost riders, and it is powerful magic that can rock the very foundations of the Ether.’ Anderson’s voice was stretched tight and the thrusting of both men had become muscle-wrenchingly tense. ‘I think that we shan’t wait long now for our release.’

The words were barely out of his mouth before Tim convulsed his load into Marie, and she was gripped with her own spasms just as Anderson shuddered over and over, filling Tim’s stretched anus with his semen. And Marie felt their combined orgasms like they all belonged to her personally, shaking and trembling as waves of pleasure broke over her again and again. 

When at last everyone could breathe, the two men shifted so their combined weight wasn’t on Marie and the three of them settled down onto the pile of cushions for a post coital snuggle. In a brief moment of guilt, Marie thought of Deacon. There had been no sign of him, no feel of him, though their lovemaking, combined with the magical bond they shared must have surely shaken the whole universe, let alone the Ether. What was he up to? But the thought did little more than register before she dozed.

Chapter 21

Marie woke chilled, uncertain of where she was, at first. She rolled on her side to find the fire had gone out, and she was nearly naked on the floor. The memories of the evening’s passions rushed back to her, but the warmth at her centre was fleeting. The house was cold and dark, and she was alone. ‘Anderson? Tim?’ she called. But there was no answer. She fumbled for her clothes and dressed quickly, then walked from room to room, flipping on light switches as she went, feeling a sense of being watched. But there was no one else in the house, and there was no burning between her hip bones to indicate the presence of ghosts. 

Cautiously, she opened the kitchen door and stepped out onto the porch. The night was silent and star-dusted, with the crescent moon hanging heavily just above the fells. Tim’s Land Rover was parked exactly where he had parked it when they arrived earlier. ‘Anderson?’ She called out again. There was nothing. 

She stood for a second holding her breath, contemplating whether she should hop in the car and go to Elemental Cottage, or stay put. Just as she stepped off the porch toward her house, the mare screamed from the stables and she froze in her tracks. 

The paddock was well lit, and there was electricity in the barn. Without giving herself time to think, she slipped into her sandals and made her way as quietly as she could into the paddock, hand clenching at the amulet around her neck. Something definitely wasn’t right, and yet, she felt no presence of ghosts. That in itself wasn’t right. Tim had told her there were always ghosts around Lacewing Cottage, had been since they found out what he was, and even more so since she had arrived. And yet she felt nothing.

She slowed her pace at the door to the stable, scarcely daring to breathe. She could hear the mare kicking and snorting and whickering in her stall. Carefully she felt for the light, and when she could see, she went straight to the horse who tossed her head, wide-eyed and shifted nervously from foot to foot. 

‘Easy, easy, girl.’ She spoke softly, hoping the horse couldn’t smell her own nerves. ‘Sh! Shhh. It’s all right.’ She grabbed the lead rope and threw it over the horse’s neck so she would at least have a little control over the animal. She pulled her close until the mare’s head was near her chest, then gently she stroked her neck and face, holding her securely and speaking softly until the horse had calmed a bit. ‘That’s it, girl. It’ll be all right,’ she whispered, hoping she wasn’t lying, but pretty sure she was. 

It was then she noticed Tim sprawled in the dark corner of the stable and he wasn’t moving. But before she could go to him, fire flashed low in her belly like nothing she had felt before, doubling her over, taking her breath away, causing the hair to rise along the back of her neck. The mare jerked away, reared, and then stood trembling at the back of her stall, nostrils flared, eyes wide. Very slowly Marie straightened and turned. She knew what she would see, what she most didn’t want to see.

Deacon loomed larger than life, backlit from the stable yard light and standing in the open door between her and escape. He beckoned her. ‘Leave Mr Meriwether, or I shall kill him now before your eyes, and it will be you who is to blame.’ His voice vibrated up through her with a heavy cold thrum. 

Feeling like her skin would crawl off her, she moved slowly toward him. He chuckled softly and took her into his arms in an embrace that, in spite of herself, she longed to return. ‘Come, my darling. We are not strangers. I know your body, do I not? I smell your heat. Do I not know how to ignite it, how to stoke it, how to make you lust?’ He stroked her hair, and she wanted him desperately, she felt like her world would end if she couldn’t have him. Then she remembered Serina, and grasped her mirror in a white knuckle grip, an act which made him laugh out loud. 

‘Oh, my dear, how you tremble. Do I frighten you? I do, don’t I?’ He guided her hand to the bulge in his trousers. ‘And your fear is exquisite, Marie, deliciously fine-tuned and elemental. A woman who fears as exquisitely as you do cannot but bring me pleasure untold. Even more so than your lust or your pain.’ He yanked her to him with a fist curled in the back of her hair. 

His breath was hot, yet sweet against her face, so close to her parted lips that she could almost taste it, and it was the quick, harsh breath of a man aroused. ‘No one can help you, Marie. The ghost you’ve been so happily fucking is now trapped in the Ether he is such a master of. Whether or not he will ever be able to find his way back, I cannot say. The Ether is a very large place. No one at Elemental Cottage knows that anything is wrong. I’ve made sure of that. They are happily casting their worthless binding spell, thinking that they may trap me as they did before, thinking that they may take away my flesh as easily as they do with simpering perverted ghosts.’ He pulled her still closer until his erection raked at her through his trousers, and the heat flared and burned like desire held too long. ‘I assure you, they are not concerned with you or your friends. They think you are spreading your legs in orgiastic bliss.’ 

He took her hand, still gripping the mirror, folded his enormous fist around it and squeezed until bones cracked and glass shattered. The mirror broke with a pop and a scrape, and pain sliced through her palm. She sucked a sharp breath between her teeth and felt her blood, warm and sticky, in her fisted hand. As he relaxed his grip, the broken mirror slid from her fingers and shattered further as it hit the concrete floor of the stable.

The laugh that rose from deep in his chest was anything but humorous. ‘Do you really believe that you have any power over me, you foolish little girl.’ He tightened the fist in her hair to a painful grip and half dragged, half marched her into the paddock with her clenching her bloodied hand against her chest. There he shoved her onto the ground in front of the water trough and knelt next to her, still holding her by the back of the neck. For a frightening second, she though he was going to force her head under. 

‘Look! Look,’ he roared. ‘And I will show you what has come to pass at my hand, Marie Warren.’ He forced her head closer to the dark surface. ‘Then I shall show you what the future holds, and I shall bask in your fear.’

The surface of the water shimmered, then stilled and darkened. A panicked face rose from beneath the water, as though it were her own reflection, a beautiful face, eyes wide, hair floating wildly through the water, mouth open in a desperate plea that would never be heard.

Marie yelped and tried to pull back, but Deacon held her there, only a breath away from the surface of the water. ‘What? Do you not recognize your predecessor, Marie? Rayna, Guardian of the West and of Water.’ He chuckled. ‘Not a very good guardian, I fear, but you cannot imagine how much pleasure I had with her in her element of water, nor how long it can take one to drown when one is not pressed for time. Perhaps I will show you one day.’ He pulled her to his chest and tenderly stroked her hair, then her back. ‘But that shall not soon be your fate, my darling. With Serina’s unfortunate demise, I am left without a Help Meet, a companion, if you will, and though my lovely witch at Rosthwaite is brighter than my poor little Serina was, she is nowhere near as interesting as you are, with your delicious aroma of fear, and your spirited defiance – when you’re not pissing yourself in panic, that is. I find the combination so very intriguing.’ 

He lifted her chin with a finger, forcing her to meet his gaze. ‘Are you skilled with a knife, my darling? No I suppose you wouldn’t be, would you? Never mind. You will become so after enough practice.’ He pushed her head down toward the surface of the water again. ‘And I have devised such a perfect training exercise for you.’

The water rippled, then cleared and she saw Tim tied to a post, his hands above his head, his body exposed to the knife she wielded. 

‘When I lived and breathed as you do, Marie Warren, I used to hunt for sport,’ Deacon whispered next to her ear. ‘I took many trophies in my day, and my skills at skinning an animal, any kind of an animal, were admirable. I am so longing to pass on that skill to a worthy servant.’

Her stomach lurched and she swallowed bile. ‘I would never –’

The hand in her hair migrated to an uncomfortably tight caress of her throat. ‘Ah, but you will, my darling.’ He pressed closer to her, in a tight embrace from behind that forced the breath from her lungs. His voice was a humid whisper against her ear. ‘Soon, I will fuck you, Marie, and you will beg me for it, you will want it as you have never in your life wanted anything. And when I have given you ecstasy you cannot yet imagine, you will gladly do my bidding. Oh yes, you will wield the knife gladly, all the while your lust will burn for the reward you know only I can give you.’

The image of Tim on the dark surface of the water writhed in anguish as she watched herself take the knife to the tender skin just below his navel.

‘You will know what you are doing, and you will loath the very act, my darling, but you will not stop, you will not stop no matter how Mr Meriwether begs, for he will never be able to reward you as I can.’

‘No!’ With an effort that wrenched muscles and practically dislocated her shoulder, Marie thrust her bloodied hand into the water and it shimmered and sizzled and the image darkened and disappeared.

Deacon caught a sharp breath, roared like a maddened bull and back-handed her, sending her sprawling on the earth. ‘Stupid child! I make the future this night, and neither you nor any of your paltry friends can undo what I foresee, what I …’

His words died in his throat as Tim tackled him from behind and the two rolled and tussled, while Marie struggled not to pass out from the panic. 

‘He’s doing this to you, Marie. Fight it!’ Tim gasped from the fray. ‘It’s just panic. Fight it.’ For the briefest of seconds, Tim was mounted astride Deacon punching him in the face, and there was blood, Marie couldn’t tell who it belonged to. Frantically she looked around the paddock for anything she could use as a weapon. She tugged and pulled at the brick that had been set beneath one corner of the water trough to level it, but before it gave into her hand, Deacon rose from the dust, with Tim in front of him, a beefy forearm locked around his neck. 

He laughed as though he had just heard the funniest joke ever. ‘Impressive, Mr Meriwether. And I do like a good brawl on occasion, a part of my journey among the living that I miss from time to time. You acquitted yourself well, and I am diverted. Perhaps it is you I shall compel to be my servant. Men, after all, do understand each other so much better, do they not?’

‘Leave her alone, Deacon.’ Tim forced the words up through his constrained throat. 

‘Of course, Mr Meriwether, I will gladly leave our Marie alone if I can have you.’ He ran a hand down Tim’s chest to rest against his cock, and Tim shuddered. It was not the shudder of pain.

‘Fight him, Tim. You have to fight him.’

‘Shut up, little girl!’ Deacon’s voice was softer now, but it chilled Marie to the bone. ‘If you will give me what I want, Mr Meriwether, I will let her go. For now.’

‘He’s a liar, Tim. Don’t listen to him.’

This time, as he back handed her, Tim lunged for her, but Deacon held him tight. ‘Of course I am a liar, Mr Meriwether. And no one knows better than you how easily I twist the truth to fit my needs.’ He guided Tim’s hand to the erection pressed against his trousers. ‘What I offer you is time. Perhaps you will be able to fight my influence for a while. Certainly our Fiori did.’ He waved a hand as though he swatted away a fly. ‘I could kill you both now this very instant, and it would cause a certain amount anguish for my dear Tara Stone.’ He stroked Tim’s cock again. ‘But like any good lover, I want the pleasure to last as long as possible.’

‘Then take me and leave her alone,’ Tim repeated. ‘I’ll take my chances that Tara and the Elementals will kick your arse long before I become your boot licker.’

‘Are you crazy?’ Marie shouted, coming to her feet, this time with the brick in her hand. ‘Tim, you don’t know what it’s like, you don’t know what he’ll do to you, what he wants. Please.’

But Tim was already pulling down his jeans, his eyes locked on Deacon. As he turned to offer the demon his arse, Deacon shook his head. ‘I don’t fuck men’s arses, Mr Meriwether, and that is why you are so perfect.’ He reached out and stroked Tim’s penis and it was instantly erect. ‘You are a rider. You will have no problem keeping yourself hard enough to pleasure me. And I promise, when you have emptied yourself into my backside, you will know pleasure you have only ever dreamed of. And though you will try heroically to be loyal to your friends,’ he took Tim’s face in his hands and held his gaze. ‘You will be mine with every fibre of your being.’ With that, he lowered his trousers and offered Tim his arse.

As Tim positioned himself, suddenly Marie’s injured hand throbbed and burned. In truth she had barely been aware of the pain with everything else that was happening. It was slick with blood, and the copper sweet smell of it hit the back of her throat like whiskey, making her eyes water. With her other hand, she held the brick. She wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t really any threat to Deacon. 

The heady scent of her blood made it feel as though her whole body were pulsing, as though it were her Tim were about to push into, and she knew without a doubt he felt what she felt. Her heart raced, and this time not from fear, but from something else. She opened herself mentally, squeezing her hand shut until it throbbed angrily, and Tim was there, and suddenly she understood. As her hand throbbed with the beat of her heart, with the beat of Tim’s heart, she understood completely. Their struggle wasn’t about getting Deacon out of the flesh. What they had to do now was keep Deacon in the flesh. She didn’t know how she knew, but she knew it as surely as she knew her own breath. And in her mind’s eye, she could see the spell she needed as clear as day. Slowly, carefully, she began to weave it. She would only get one chance.